From 

My 

Corner 




Mary H- 

PEi^KINS 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

%F— - ioMng]^f%, 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



FROM MY CORNER 



FROM MY CORNER 

LOOKING AT LIFE 
IN SUNSHINE AND 



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'i'* 



'^ SHADOW 



By- 

MARY H. PERKINS 
("Dorcas Hicks") 



'Tis sunshine where the shadow Jiel^ 

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NEW YORK ' -' — 

ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH 
AND COMPANY (Inc.) 
182 Fifth Avenue 






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Copyright^ r8g4y 
By Anson D. F. Randolph and Co. 






John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

From My Corner 7 

The Stops as well as the Steps . 14 

Wrong at the Start 20 

Farewell? No! 26 

No Introduction 31 

Peter Crump's Dream . . . , . 38 

From the Back Seat 44 

Those Few Sweet Words .... 50 

" In Green Pastures " ^^ 

"Thou Becamest Mine" .... 62 

Opportunities . 69 

"This is Our Refreshing" ... 73 

Broken Things 80 

No Further 86 

A Paradox of Saint Peter ... 93 

An Old Cradle . 100 

Secret Things 106 

Are Your Windows Washed? . .112 



vi Contents. 

PAGE 

"Them Also" ii6 

"Little Children" 121 

In School 128 

"Don't let's forget the One 

we're following" 134 

Tired Eyes 139 

Infirmities 145 

Baskets as a Means of Grace . 151 

By Name 157 

Autumn Colors 165 

On the Mount 171 

Quietness and Confidence . . .177 

Those that "Remain" 181 

Suffer them to Come unto Me . 188 
Showing forth His Death . . .191 
Another Communion Thought . . 197 
Their Message 203 



I 



FROM MY CORNER. 

Whereby I mean that small portion of 
one room in my home where I usually 
live, — where I gather round me my spe- 
cial belongings, my implements of labor, 
my habitual companions, my daily life. 
Have not you, too, such a comer, dear 
reader? I take it for granted that you 
have, and propose that we draw a few 
lessons from these corners of ours. In 
order to this, I will show you a little of 
mine, and try to guess somewhat con- 
cerning yours. 

One good thing about mine (and I 
hope you can say the same of yours) is 
that I have much of God's blessed sun- 
light in it. We need this for our physi- 
cal and mental health in any place where 



8 From My Corner, 

much of our life is spent ; and, if it is 
possible, our "corners" should always 
have it. Another presence in mine is 
that of books, — usually silent, indeed, but 
eloquent and sympathetic when called 
upon to speak. Some pictures look 
down upon me with quiet eyes of love 
and friendship, or suggest distant scenes 
of grandeur and beauty. All sorts of 
odds and ends, contributing to comfort 
and convenience, greet me from desk, 
and table, and floor, and wall, telling of 
kind thought or loving remembrance. 

Sometimes a soft-footed puss creeps 
into my corner and purrs out its approval 
of the light and warmth, and its content with 
life in general. Letters come here from 
almost all quarters of the globe, and carry 
me in thought and interest to the lands 
from whence they come. 

Have I told you enough of my corner 
to give you an imaginary glimpse into it? 



From My Corner, 9 

Let me, then, fancy something of yours. 
I think some of you have a Hght Httle 
nook, where a low rocking-chair stands, 
with a piled-up work-basket by its side. 
A few toys are on the floor, brought 
thither by busy Httle hands, which carry 
everything movable to where mamma is. 
A great deal of work, and not a little 
play, goes on in this corner as the days 
glide by, and some care and anxiety sit 
down here, too. Baby griefs come hither 
to be soothed, and baby hearts are here 
taught of Him who ^' suffered the little 
ones to come unto Him." Perhaps Jesus 
has *^ called a little child" to Himself, 
who once lightened this corner — if so, 
there is often an unseen presence from 
the Home above, filling the place with 
unspeakable thoughts and unutterable 
longings, which make it a very sacred 
and precious spot. If there is a room 
in any house where we may believe that 



lo From My Comer. 

Jesus abides, it is surely the mother's 
corner in a Christian home. 

But your corner may have quite another 
character belonging to it. It may hold 
the materials out of which you bring forth 
many a " thing of beauty " to be ^^ a 
joy," for a time at least, — until Bridget 
breaks or defaces it in her vigorous 
dusting, — to your friends. You gather 
around you in the place where you paint, 
or draw, or design, whatever is helpful 
and inspiring to you ; and while to an 
uninstructed or uninterested eye your 
corner is perhaps unattractive and dis- 
orderly, you see possibilities of creation 
and combination which you can hardly 
wait to realize. Of necessity you have 
your corner much to yourself, for its 
appurtenances and the character of your 
work demand solitude. Even my velvet- 
toed pussy would work mischief in it, 
doubtless, and the busy little fingers 



From My Corner. ii 

round mamma's chair would never do 
here. 

And so we might go on to imagine 
other corners, each holding a little world 
of interest, enjoyment, and labor, in 
which the life of each one of us centres, 
and from which it radiates to touch other 
lives. How can we make our corners 
always a blessing to ourselves and to 
others ? For, undoubtedly^ we can make 
them places of selfish, narrow isolation, 
where we shut ourselves out from the 
world about us, and the friends who 
would seek us, and exclude duties and 
interests which knock at the door of 
heart and conscience just as loudly, and 
with as large a claim, as those which 
we choose to admit. 

Well, let us be sure first that the 
Master, whose we are and whom we 
serve, abides with us all day and every 
day, in these corners of ours. This will 



12 From My Corner. 

keep us from narrowness or selfishness, 
for if He is there it will be because we 
not only invite Him, but recognize His 
presence and consult Him in what we 
do — and we shall take His views of 
life and duty, nor set any closer limita- 
tions to these than He Himself places. 

And we can be careful of what comes 
into and goes forth from these corners, 
around which, in reality, or in symbolism, 
nearly every woman's life centres. We 
can admit only what will directly or in- 
directly educate end elevate the soul, 
bringing it nearer to its God. We can 
see to it that none but helpful, refresh- 
ing streams flow from the fountain which 
is here fed. 

We must be watchful against impa- 
tience of intrusion into our corners, or 
of interruption in the employment which 
absorbs and delights us there. It will 
be bad for ourselves and for others if we 



From My Corner. 13 

give ground for jealous pain and disap- 
pointment in the minds of those about 
us, who would fain have something from 
us which we do not give, because of our 
being too much wedded to these precious 
corners of ours. 

Let the lightness and the comfort and 
the blessing which they bring to us be 
spread abroad just as far as the provi- 
dence of God opens the avenues, and 
let many who will never look upon our 
homes or upon our faces, have cause to 
bless the Lord for the work done, of 
whatever kind, in your corner and in 
mine. 



THE STOPS AS WELL AS THE 
STEPS. 

It is easy enough for us to believe that 
" The steps of a good man are ordered 
by the Lord," and to take all the comfort 
possible out of our Christ-given right to 
appropriate to ourselves this assurance. 
We learn, as we go on in life, to trust 
gladly in this " ordering," whether it be 
in the great movements or crises of our 
experience, or in the smaller duties and 
affairs of every day's occurrence. In youth 
we may think that we should hke to " or- 
der " our own lives, with their successive 
steps, according to our own delightful plan, 
— but we do not get very far on our way 
without discovering that ignorance of the 
ground and the frequent impossibility of 



The Stops as well as the Steps. 15 

walking as we would, make it a very 
blessed thing to ^' commit our way " alto- 
gether to One who, knowing the end from 
the beginning, will guide the feet safely 
and surely over all the road between. 

But a recent devout writer speaks of 
^'allowing God's time-table to supersede 
our own," and '' recognizing His planning 
as put forth in the stops as well as the 
steps." There is a deep thought here 
which it may do many of us good to pon- 
der for a moment, especially those who 
have been called to slop. 

When we are in the full tide of active 
service for God and men, in the lines 
opened to us and clearly pointed out by 
God Himself, it is not always — is it ever ? 
— easy to stop short, lay down the work, 
or give it into the hands of others, and 
accept the divine ordering of the ^^ halt " 
as heartily as of the ^^ advance." It 
seems as if we could serve God so much 



1 6 The Stops as well as the Steps. 

better by doing something ; by speaking 
or writing, planning or organizing, teach- 
ing or exhorting, raising money or spend- 
ing it, stirring up others or leading their 
newly kindled enthusiasm, than by sitting 
down in silence before the Lord. And 
so we chafe against these "stops,'' and 
almost think that they must be devices of 
the evil one to hinder and distress us, not 
gentle orderings of our loving Father to 
rest and quiet us. 

Yet the usefulness — nay, the necessity 
— of stops is recognized in every under- 
taking which involves many steps. The 
ascent of a lighthouse or high tower of 
any kind would be far more wearisome if 
there were not breaks in the successive 
steps, — little platforms or level places 
where the muscles may relax their strain 
for a moment. And in the long tours 
which travellers plan, arrangements for 
occasional seasons of rest, longer or 



The Stops as well as the Steps. 1 7 

shorter, are always made if the travellers 
are wise. Many a foreign tour has been 
well-nigh ruinous to health and strength 
because the stops have been neglected. 
Nor need we look further than our own 
hallowed Sabbath day to realize the God- 
given benefit and blessing of a pause — a 
stop — in the treadmill of the work which 
is His law for men. 

So it is not a strange thing if, in our 
Father's orderings of His children's lives, 
He brings them now and again to quiet 
places where He bids them stay a while, 
and let the march of the world's work — 
yes, and the church's work — go on with- 
out them. Of ourselves we might never 
come to just the time when we thought 
we could fold our hands and cease from 
our activities. It seems to us that this 
and that and the other interest would 
surely suffer if we failed to keep our hand 
upon them ; or at least we should like to 



1 8 The Stops as well as the Steps. 

choose the time for rest when it seems to 
our view that we can best be spared. 

But our wise and loving Father does 
not leave it to us or our choosing. In 
His own way, at His own time, suddenly 
or by degrees, gently or with swift, strong 
hand. He draws us away from the work 
and the associations which are filling our 
hearts and hands, and bids us stop for 
a while. We look up to Him and say, 
" Lord, this cannot be ! I was serving 
Thee out there ! There is no one to take 
my place, — Thy work will suffer." 

Yet firmly He holds us where we are, 
whispering, if we will but listen, words of 
comfort and assurance to our souls, show- 
ing us that it is all of His ordaining, the 
stops as well as the steps, and that, as He 
has ordained it all, there is no fear that 
aught will really suffer because one or an- 
other is brought to the resting-time before 
his work seems done. Then yielding to 



The Stops as well as the Steps. 19 

Him, waiting on Him, trusting in Him, we 
may learn such lessons that ever after this 
time shall be remembered as one in 
which we were truly ^^ taught of the 
Lord," and '^ great" was our " peace." 

Do not grieve nor murmur, then, you 
who are in the midst of busy, active life, 
if the summons comes to you in any form 
to turn aside and leave all your plans and 
labors for a time. Your clock may not 
yet point to the hour for rest. God sees 
that the hour has come, and calls you 
away. If you are conscious of seeking to 
serve Him in your steps, recognize now 
His guidance in the stop to which His 
providence points, and you will not fail 
of the blessing there awaiting you. 



WRONG AT THE START. 

In common with the rest of my sex, 
I, Dorcas Hicks, am much given to the 
practice of knitting. While reading, 
either silently or aloud, I am in the 
habit of aiding my perceptions, and em- | 
ploying my otherwise idle hands, by 
making my needles fly and my stock- 
ing grow. To this habit of mine the • 
reflections are due which will be shortly ' 
set forth. 

Every woman at all skilled in the noble 
art of knitting understands what is meant 
by ribbing. To others the word may 
have different meanings, — to a knitter 
it bears but one. She knows that if 
one or more stitches are knit alternately 
plain and seamed (there again the con- 



Wrong at the Start. 21 

noisseur will understand me), it pro- 
duces raised ridges at even distances, 
running lengthwise of the work. Thus 
far by way of explanation. I, Dorcas 
Hicks, was peacefully pursuing the 
double employment of reading and rib- 
bings the other day. I was nearly across 
the needle, which had a good many 
stitches on it, when I chanced to look 
at my work, and saw that my ribbing 
was not going on as it should. I was 
seaming when I should have been knit- 
ting plain, I picked back two or three 
stitches to find my mistake. Still wrong. 
Two or three more. Wrong yet. I 
pulled the yarn out of several more, 
without finding the one wrong stitch for 
which I looked. I ran my eye along all 
the stitches in the row. Ah ! thought I, 
wrong at the start ; that *s it. So out 
came the needle, and down went all the 
stitches to the beginning of the row. 



22 



IVrong at the Start, 



There was the mistake, I began with 
knitting plain when I should have seamed. 
This was soon set right, the stitches taken 
up, and the work resumed. But my mind, 
instead of going back to the book I had 
been reading, dwelt musingly on the 
words ''wrong at the start.''^ 

How easy it was for me, when I found 
where my error began, to whip my work 
all out quickly and start aright ! Would 
it were always as easy for those who 
begin wrong to take out their mistake 
and start again aright ! The errors of a 
life often come from being wrong at the 
start, — from want of proper care and 
training at the beginning; from setting 
out with false principles, or with none 
at all ; from not realizing the importance 
of starting aright. 

Certainly a person may begin all fair 
and well, and fall into dire mistakes and 
snares afterwards ; but with a due knowl- 



IVrong at the Start, 23 

edge of what is true and right, and a pur- 
pose with the help of the Mighty One to 
keep in the good way, one is more Hkely 
to go on well to the end, than if he begin 
his course in indifference, error, or sin. 

Another thought that came to me was 
this. If we find ourselves involved in 
wrong or trouble caused by our own 
acts, we had better not be satisfied with 
smoothing it over and trying somehow, 
we know not exactly how, to bring it 
out right. No, we shall probably find 
that we were wrong at the start, and 
we had best go to the root of the 
matter at once, undo all that we can 
of what has been wrong, — alas ! often 
that is not much, — and start aright again 
if possible. 

We form a plan for pleasure or for 
profit. It does not prosper or succeed 
in its object; it grieves and disappoints 
instead. Perhaps we started wrong in 



24 Wrong at the Start. 

not asking the blessing of God upon it ; 
in not being sure that our motives and 
our means were pure and generous. It 
may be that it was all fair, and that for 
some other reason our plans have failed. 
But it will be wise to look well into it, 
and find out whether we started aright. 

There is one great comfort in all these 
reflections. We may have been alto- 
gether wrong at the start, have gone 
wrong ever since, and be in a dark 
wilderness of perplexity and doubt. We 
feel that we cannot undo our errors as 
we can our knitting — in their conse- 
quences to others or to ourselves ; and the 
thought weighs upon us. But the com- 
fort is, that our lives cannot be so dark, 
or so wrong, or so harmful, that God's 
love cannot reach us. Although we cannot 
go back and begin our work over again, 
we can have all its sin and evil washed 
away from record by the blood of Jesus ; 



..sfis;^^^ 



Wrong at the Start, 25 

and we can start anew from this moment 
to " do what our hands find to do," with 
light and strength beyond our own vouch- 
safed to us. 

All this we can have for the simple 
asking in faith and humility for Jesus' 
sake. Then, however wrong at the start 
we have been, we may be sure, through 
our blessed Saviour's merit, of being right 
at the end. 



FAREWELL? NO! 

Did we really bid farewell to that dear 
friend whom we laid in the grave to-day 
^^ in the sure and certain hope of a glori- 
ous resurrection "? Or did we only say 
'' good-by " — God be with you — for the 
little time that is to separate us? We say 
" good-by '^ cheerfully to the visitor who 
has spent an hour with us; to the one 
who leaves us or is left in the morning for 
the daily task or toil ; to the merry boy 
or girl who dances or runs from our side 
to school or play. We scarcely say ^^ fare- 
well" to any of these; it would sound 
too sad or solemn in our ears, and would 
betoken too long a separation. To be 
sure, the Friends say '- farewell/' or '^fare 
thee well," instead of ^^ good-by," on all 



Farewell? No! 27 

occasions, but their habitual use of the 
word gives it a different sound and mean- 
ing on their lips from what it has on 
those of others. 

Well, that dear one who went away 
two or three days ago, and whose empty 
tabernacle we have put out of sight for 
the present, until, renewed and glorified, 
it shall be re-inhabited by the sweet spirit 
now gone from it, — shall we say a long 
" farewell " to her, as if this parting were 
really the end of all our happy inter- 
course ? 

Ah, let us use no such melancholy word 
in this connection. Let us rather whisper 
*^ good-by, dear," to her in our thought, 
or ^^ good-night," as one whom we shall 
surely meet again in the morning after 
the brief night of separation is past. She 
was so full of life and of interest in all 
that life held for her, and it held so much / 
She cannot have gone into utter forgetful- 



28 Farewell? No! 

ness of what but a few days ago filled her 
unselfish heart and her busy, thoughtful 
brain. She knows a larger, wider, higher 
life indeed, and ^^ eye hath not seen, nor 
ear heard, neither hath entered into the 
heart of man " the " bliss beyond com- 
pare '* of " the place prepared " for her. 
But it is not possible to believe that even 
in that '^ bliss " the dear home and those 
in it whom she so loved to gather around 
her, and whom it was the chief object of 
her life to make happy, are nothing to 
her now, altogether outside of her thought, 
or care, or interest. 

May it not be in truth that in the freer 
existence which is hers now, she may 
come much closer to her beloved ones 
than she ever did when the body held the 
spirit captive to its Hmitations? We are 
told in the Word of God that w^e are 
" compassed about '^ with the '^ cloud of 
witnesses *' who testify to the power of 



Farewell? No! 29 

the faith of those who have gone before 
and who watch our " running of the race 
that is set before us.'^ Surely, if the saints 
and believers of old thus '^ compass us 
about/' we can easily believe that our 
dear, familiar friends who have gone 
" within the veil '* are as near as these 
strangers, — nay, are much nearer, and 
are watching us with far deeper and more 
loving interest than they. It is our side 
of the separating veil that is dense and 
obscuring, not theirs, we may be sure of 
that. 

Then do not let us sadly and with 
streaming eyes say " farewell " to the 
bright, sweet one who has gone a little 
before us into the "Father's House." 
x^s we bid her " good-by " for a time, let 
us clasp to our hearts the conviction that 
she is not far away ; that her love and 
tender sympathy are still ours, only with 
the dross and taint of earth all gone from 



so Farewell ? No ! 

them, and the breath of heaven making 
them pure and powerful to bless us. So 
may her going from us draw us mightily 
towards the heavenly home, and she be 
even a richer blessing beyond our sight 
than when we took sweet counsel together 
and walked hand in hand along earth's 
ways. 



NO INTRODUCTION. 

Two pilgrims were nearing the gate 
of the Heavenly City, They were both 
somewhat weary and worn with the long 
journey; their garments were dusty and 
travel- stained ; they showed the marks 
of many a conflict and many a slip by 
the way, though their faces were bright 
and their step still firm and buoyant. 
Evidently to both of them the end now 
near at hand was a glad and welcome 
termination to a toilsome pilgrimage, in 
which many experiences and events had 
been common to both. 

But one strange thing was apparent as 
they travelled along the narrow way : they 
did not seem to know each other. They 
never talked together ; they rarely looked 



32 No Introduction. 

at each other ; they walked side by side, 
near together, at stated times approach- 
ing each other so closely that their cloth- 
ing almost touched, and they seemed 
sometimes as if they actually leaned upon 
the same staff for support, yet so far as 
friendly intercourse or exchange of thought 
and sympathy was concerned, they might as 
well have been thousands of miles apart. 

There were other pilgrims on the road, 
and that these two were not deaf and 
dumb was evident from the fact of their 
calling to the others, sometimes across the 
little distance that separated them, and 
occasionally joining them for a while, keep- 
ing up with them an animated talk. But 
it looked very much as if the journey, 
which had evidently been long to both 
of them, had been much of it travelled 
in close proximity to each other, yet in 
cold silence and mutual indifference. 
How singular ! How unnatural 1 



No Introduction. ^z 

Let us draw near to these travellers 
and ask them the reason of this strange 
non -intercourse. 

" Friend, you look as if your journey 
had been long and difficult, and its end, 
now near at hand, is welcome to you. 
Have you had your fellow- pilgrim long 
near you to cheer and help you on the 
way? " 

With a half-indifferent glance around, 
the traveller said, " Oh, you mean this 
one by my side? Indeed, I do not 
know. I never noticed very much who 
was near me. Now you speak of it, I 
have seen this person often before, and we 
must have travelled together a long time." 

" Did you start together? " 

"No, I think not. I think I set out 
first, and my neighbor came into the 
way some time afterwards, and happened 
to fall into just the same part of the 
path where I was already walking." 
3 



34 A^^ Introduction, 

" And why do you travel along so 
silently together, as if you were strangers 
to each other? " 

'^ Oh, we have never been introduced. 
We could not speak, you know, unless 
we had been." 

Did we hear aright ? Is there no pos- 
sibility that our ears have played us a 
trick? Let us ask a little further. 

" Did we understand you rightly, 
friend, that you two have been prac- 
tically strangers to each other, never 
taking ' sweet counsel together ' or help- 
ing each other by word or look on the 
way, simply because you have never been 
formally introduced to each other by 
name? " 

" Certainly, that is what I mean.*' 

"But you must have been through 
many experiences, joyful and sorrowful, 
together, in this journey of yours. You 
must have rested side by side at times 



No Introduction. 35 

on the hill-top of special blessing, and 
passed in company through dark and 
trying hollows in the valley of humilia- 
tion. You must have sung praises often 
in unison, and shed tears of tender peni- 
tence under the softening touch of the 
same gentle hand. You must have 
stopped together in the King's houses 
of refreshment, where He meets His 
pilgrims by the way and sups with them, 
and they with Him. Is it possible that 
you have in all this long journey thus 
shared in privilege and blessing, in trial 
and temptation, in communion with the 
Lord of the country, and in glad antici- 
pation of the Father's house at the end, 
and yet waited to be introduced?" 

" Well, yes, we have. But it never 
seemed so strange before. It seemed 
to be only the way of the world." 

" The way of the world ! But is that 
the pilgrim'' s way? Or should it be? 



S6 No Introduction. 

And could not you and your fellow- 
pilgrim in all these years have helped 
and cheered each other many and many 
a time by a word or a clasp of the hand, 
a smile of sympathy in joy or a . tear 
shed for the other's woe? Did not the 
Lord put you side by side for some such 
purpose as this? " 

Reader, will you make the application 
for yourself? You are a member of a 
Christian church. Do you sit Sabbath 
after Sabbath in the church, or week 
after week in the chapel or lecture-room, 
near other members of the same church, 
travelling the self- same road, tried and 
cheered by the same general experiences, 
" sitting together often in heavenly places 
in Christ Jesus," bowed together in peni- 
tent sorrow for coldness and departure 
from the right way, looking with joyful 
hope towards the same blessed home 
above, yet never speaking to each other 



No Introduction. 37 

or taking one another by the hand, be- 
cause you have '^ never been introduced^^ ? 
Let the dear Saviour, who walks with 
you and with these, your fellow-members 
of the same household of faith, introduce 
you. Let Him name you to each other 
as disciples of His own. Let the mark 
of discipleship which you both bear be 
recognized gladly as sufficient introduc- 
tion and recommendation. Let His love 
so fill your hearts that it will overflow in 
kindly, loving fellowship each with the 
other, uniting all with Him. 



PETER CRUMP'S DREAM. 

Peter Crump came home from his 
day's work one September evening, very 
tired and dispirited. He was an old 
man, fast becoming feeble, and not fit for 
much work ; but he was glad to be able 
to do anything by which he could make a 
scanty living for himself and his infirm 
wife. The work which he did was not 
heavy labor, neither did it pay him very 
well, but it was better than higher wages 
with work beyond his strength. It was 
simple, too, easy to understand and to 
accomplish, and the same day by day, 
with little or no variation. What was it? 
He was one of a procession of six men, 
each one of whom carried, up and down 
the principal streets of the city, one huge 



Peter Crump's Dream, 39 

letter painted on a board, the letters 
together forming the name — 

" WARNER.'' 

Mr. Warner was proprietor of a pano- 
rama, and adopted this among other 
methods of advertising his exhibitions. 
Peter Crump carried the first " R." He 
did not know his alphabet, for he had 
lived in great poverty and ignorance. 
But he knew that he was the third man of 
the six, that Tom Riley walked before 
him, and that his own big letter had a 
straight column at the left, a loop at the 
top on the right, with a sort of tail below 
the loop. So he plodded on behind Tom 
Riley^ who followed Sandy Trot, and he 
took good care, in their windings through 
the crowded streets, not to let old John 
Connor, with his " N,'^ pass in front of 
him. At six o'clock they carried their 
letters into Mr. Warner's establishment, 



40 Peter Crump's Dream, 

and were dismissed, each of the six old 
men thankful that his day's work was 
done. 

On this particular September evening, 
after his supper, Peter sat down on the 
door-step of the house where he and 
his wife had one small room, to smoke 
his pipe. (He might have done some- 
thing better, — perhaps something worse.) 
Peter was a good old man, upon whose 
dark, ignorant heart the love of Jesus had 
come several years before, through the 
teaching of a city missionary; and the 
light of that love had never since ceased 
to shine upon his lowly life. But he felt 
this evening as if he were very useless in 
the world, and would not be missed by 
any one except his aged wife, if he went 
to his heavenly rest that very night. 
While he thus thought, his pipe went out, 
and he fell asleep. Then he dreamed. 

He thought he was on his usual tramp, 



Peter Crump's Dream, 41 

with the giant *^ R " above his head, Tom 
Riley before him, John Connor behind. 
He was very, very tired, and yielded to 
the temptation to fall out of the line and 
sit down on some steps near at hand, 
thinking that nobody would miss him. 
But, to his astonishment, as he looked at 
his companions they immediately fell into 
a state of utter confusion. John Connor, 
seeing Peter no longer in front of him, 
thought that he had himself gone wrong, 
and stepped before Tom Riley ; and Tom, 
not having Sandy Trot in advance of him, 
turned and stepped aside behind Mike 
Trafts, who usually followed John Connor, 
carrying ^^E.'^ This discomposed old Jack- 
son Jones, who brought up the rear, with the 
last ^^ R." So the whole five were uncer- 
tain where they belonged, or who was 
wrong, and stopped in dismay. Then 
Peter dreamed that this confusion, hap- 
pening in a crowd, so separated the men 



42 Peter Crump's Dream. 

that they gradually drifted away from one 
another and out of his sight, leaving him 
sitting alone bearing his great "R," at 
which every passer-by stared and laughed, 
and finally they began to pelt it with 
stones. In the fear lest a stone should 
hit him instead of the placard, he awoke 
from his sleep. 

But his waking thoughts dwelt upon his 
dream, and they ran thus : If he had 
stayed in his place doing his duty, every- 
thing would have gone righto It was his 
yielding to temptation and shirking his 
duty which threw the whole company into 
confusion and broke up the line. Did he 
not then daily perform his small part in 
keeping that Hne all right, so that every 
beholder could read 

'' WARNER" 

as they walked? And, therefore, would 
he not be missed until his place could be 



Peter Crump's Dream. 43 

filled by another, if he failed to appear 
and take up his "R" at the right time? 
Ah, yes, thought he, God gives me this 
little work to do in my old age. I will 
do my duty where He has placed me, and 
perhaps I can glorify Him in doing it. 
At any rate, if I do it for Him, He will 
bless me. 

We all have a place in the world, a 
work to do, be it ever so small and insig- 
nificant, wherein we can glorify our Mas- 
ter. We should so live and so walk that 
our absence will be felt, and our work 
missed, when we are called away to our 
rest. And, to the all-seeing eye, failure 
in a simple duty may cause as great con- 
fusion in the moral world as his stepping 
out of the line did, in Peter Crump's 
dream. 



FROM THE BACK SEAT. 

Everybody who has ever led a mis- 
sionary or other prayer meeting knows 
how hard it is to fill the front seats so 
long as there are any vacant ones in the 
rear of the room. Those empty chairs 
or benches at the front, staring one in 
the face, make a wall of separation be- 
tween the leader and those who are led, 
and how inspiriting this arrangement is, 
those who have tried it well know. It 
may be an imaginary carrying out of the 
Bible doctrine that the lowest place is 
the right one to take until bidden to 
go higher. Perhaps it is from a modest 
desire not to be conspicuous, or it may 
chance that ease of departure at any time 
when the notion or the need demands is 
the occasion. Whatever the cause, the 



From the Back Seat. 45 

habit is familiar to all who have to do 
with the conduct of social meetings. 

But there are back seats in life, and 
people in them, for whom I want to say 
a word. They used to be at the front, 
active, earnest, glad to do their part, and 
marvelling sometimes how any one could 
sit silent and merely receptive when such 
stirring themes were handled. They 
were at home in the activities of life, 
and greatly rejoiced in the quickening, 
stimulating influence of the environment 
which was theirs. Then the time came, 
suddenly or gradually, from advancing 
years or from other causes, when they 
were compelled to withdraw from the 
busy, working life which had been so 
congenial to them, into the retirement of 
a looker-on at the world's work. 

I wonder if any one is reading these 
words whom the Master has gently led 
from the front in the work of the world 



46 From the Back Seat. 

or the church to a back seat There is 
all the difference possible between being 
led thither by Him, and choosing for 
one's self to settle down there for ease 
or inaction. One may wrap himself in 
a garment of idleness and selfishness, and 
comfortably sit down to watch and criti- 
cise those who are bearing the burdens 
and doing the hard work of the day. 
But it is another thing altogether when 
the hand of our Master draws us aside, 
and points out to us a place of rest, where 
we must stay for a time or for always, 
learning lessons of patience and trust, 
instead of doing the active service which 
we love. Thus led to it, and thus taught 
in it, our retirement may become to us a 
truly blessed place, from which we can 
look with gladness on what others are 
permitted to do, and by our sympathy 
and prayers strengthen them more than 
we know. 



From the Back Seat. 47 

Many a one who reads this will remem- 
ber times in his own life when a small (or 
great) inward battle had to be fought 
before it was easy, not to say possible, to 
see another filling the place and doing 
the work he once did and loved to do, 
but from which God had called him. No 
matter how sensibly we reason about the 
matter, or how really satisfied we are that 
the change has been right and best, or 
how truly we seek to make God's will our 
will, there come times when the back seat 
becomes very hard and uncomfortable, 
because of our longing to be up there 
among the busy workers once more. 

Well, there is only one remedy for this 
discomfort and restless longing ; but it is 
so sure and so satisfying, and withal so 
certain to be given us for the asking, that 
we need never crave it long. We have 
only to open our eyes and see that with 
us there in that dull back seat is One 



48 From the Back Seat. 

who can make it just the most blessed 
spot in this world to us. He brought us 
there, we may well believe, in order that 
He might show Himself to us in new ways, 
and whisper to us words of inspiration 
and comfort such as He never could have 
spoken, and we never could have heard, 
out in the busy ranks of the workers. 
Some things that our Master has to say 
to us must be said " apart, in the desert 
places" of life, — not on the highway or 
in the market-place. Shall we complain, 
then, when He gently leads us where He 
can say them ? I think that any one who 
has ever heard these special words that 
He speaks to His resting, waiting children 
will surely with great gladness follow Him 
when He thus beckons them away into 
the quiet places. 

Let us never despise or avoid the back 
seats of life, — especially as we grow older 
and may be compelled to take them, 



From the Back Seat, 49 

whether we will or no. Let us sit in 
them willingly, cheerfully, patiently, glad 
for those who are still permitted to be at 
the front, but thankful beyond expression 
for the '^ green pastures** and *^ still wa- 
ters '* which the Good Shepherd provides 
for those whom He has withdrawn from 
very active life. Then the back seats, 
instead of being dreary and hard, will be 
mdeed '^ heavenly places in Christ Jesus." 



THOSE FEW SWEET WORDS. 

They may not, perhaps, have been 
many; you may be one not lavish of 
endearments towards any of those whom 
you love. You may even have a con- 
tempt for the habit which you call 
"gush," and which seems to you to flow 
from a very shallow fountain. But away 
back somewhere in your life there were 
a few loving words not seldom on your 
lips, which used to be very sweet to the 
ears of your husband, your wife, your 
child, your brother or sister or friend. 
These learned to listen for them, to long 
for them if they tarried a while, to de- 
pend upon them for much of day-by-day 
cheer ; for they knew that your love was 
very true and strong for them, and that 



Those Few Sweet Words. 51 

the precious words were but the over- 
flowing of that love. 

Well, the years have gone on, the gray 
hairs have come, the passions of youth 
have died down into calmness and rest, 
the child is a man or a woman, the 
brother or sister has other ties and an- 
other home, the friend of other days has 
gone into a line of life a little divergent 
from yours ; and so it has come to pass 
that the words once so sweet to speak 
and to hear are never uttered now be- 
tween you and those for whom deep 
down in your heart there is yet abiding 
love. They are never spoken, those few 
familiar, caressing words ; but are you 
sure that they are never missed? You 
may think that the bustle and turmoil 
of life would have stifled the sound of 
them if they had not choked their utter- 
ance ; but perhaps, perhaps, all this time 
when you have been withholding them, 



52 Those Few Sweet Words. 

ears have been strained and hearts 
wearied, in the Hstening and longing 
for at least the echo of those old sweet 
words. 

Ask one who, amid the many changes 
and trials and varied experiences of a 
long Hfe, has had the blessing of a stead- 
fast human love, not only understood and 
tested, but also expressed and manifested 
continually, what it has been, as the years 
have gone on, to have constant evidence 
in words as well as in deeds that those 
years have only deepened and strength- 
ened the faithful love. Then ask that 
other one, who has true and undoubted 
love and friendship close at hand, but 
who rarely or never hears a whisper of 
either to warm the heart or moisten the 
eye, — who remembers with what is almost 
pain the sweet words which used to tell 
of cherishing or admiring love, but which 
are never spoken now that youth with its 



Those Few Sweet Words, 53 

charms has departed, — ask such an one 
what it would be to hear those words 
again, in the old tone and with the old 
life breathing in them. Do you see the 
eyes fill and the face soften, and do you 
hear the voice grow husky and a sob rise 
in the throat at the very thought of what 
that would be ? 

Only a few sweet, loving words, that 
is all ; but coming from the heart and 
going to the heart, they would brighten 
many a life and comfort many a soul as 
the speaker of them little knows. Let 
us not be so chary of them, especially 
as we get far on in the journey of life, 
and often find the way a little hard and 
wearisome. If they are but few, let them 
be often spoken between us, we who love 
each other in any relation of life. It is 
easy to get out of the way of speaking 
them ; but it is not easy sometimes to 
get out of the way of hearing them, when 



54 Those Few Sweet IVords, 

once they have made their sweet music in 
our ears. And let us^ for our own sakes, 
be sure to speak them before the hearts 
which they might gladden have gone be- 
yond the veil that hides them from our 
earthly love and care. 

This human love of ours is surely one 
of God's best gifts to us ; and He must 
mean that we shall use it for the help 
and comfort of others with whom He 
links our lives. But, after all, it is but 
one expression of His own infinite love 
for us, which knows no change or 
diminution because of change in us. 
If we ever long for or miss sweet words 
from those whom we love on earth, let 
us turn with satisfied hearts to the wealth 
of precious promises and comforting as- 
surances in the Word of God, and say 
with the Psalmist, ** How sweet are Thy 
words unto my taste ! " They are too 
many to quote or even to suggest here ; 



Those Few Sweet Words, 55 

but they tell of such companionship, such 
watching, such cherishing, such "hold- 
ing," such guiding and protection, — in 
short, such loving, — that none need ever 
be really lonely or sad or heart-hungry 
while such a Friend and Lover is near. 
The more we reahze this love, the more 
will our hearts go out towards one an- 
other, and the more we shall be inclined to 
"comfort one another" with words which 
tell of both divine and human love. 



'MN GREEN PASTURES-'' 

Were there ever words more sugges- 
tive of rest and quiet and beauty than 
those three whereby David describes the 
divine shepherding of his soul? They 
mean, in their first sense, so much of 
comfort for eye and ear and foot, in the 
bright color and gentle sound and soft 
tread of rich pasture-land; and in their 
deeper meaning, they speak of such lov- 
ing thought of the soul's need, and pro- 
vision for it, as no human care could 
furnish. What are they, — those " green 
pastures " of which the Psalmist writes? 

Well, from the windows of my summer 
home, and from my big tent in the 
meadow close by, I look upon ^^ green 
pastures " every day. So I have come 



''In Green Pastures.'' 57 

to think about them, and to love them, 
and to learn from them at least some of 
the lessons which the great Teacher has 
put into them for me. All through the 
long summer they are so beautiful ! In 
its first weeks they are covered with the 
growing grass, day by day taller, richer, 
fuller, until it waves and bows and 
shakes itself in the wind as if alive to 
its influence and rejoicing therein. Then 
comes the mowing time, when it is all 
laid low by the ruthless machine, but 
only to give forth the very sweetest per- 
fume, I sometimes think, that ever greets 
our senses. No wonder that perfumers 
try to imitate the scent of " new-mown 
hay," and no wonder that they fail. 
When the air is filled with the fresh 
fragrance of the field, one thinks with 
scorn of the bottled stuff bearing the 
name and professing to hold the es- 
sence. Only nature and nature's God 



58 *' In Green Pastures.'^ 

could make such sweet odors as haying 
time brings to the dwellers in His '^ green 
pastures." 

And so it is tossed and spread, and 
raked into heaps, to lie quiet while the 
sun and wind do their daily work upon 
it, until it is ready for the gathering into 
barns. I think betimes that this is the 
most charming time of all in my " green 
pastures." The shaven and shorn ground, 
with its picturesque mounds of hay, is 
invaded by the slow-moving oxen or quiet 
farm horses drawing the big hay- wagon ; 
and as they go from one hay-cock to 
another, the men lifting the fragrant 
heaps on high, and tossing them upon 
the wagon, where another hand lays them 
in place that the load may be even and 
the pile steady, it is a sight most restful 
to eyes weary of city scenes. So they go 
round the field, until the load is high and 
the driver almost hidden from view, and 



"In Green Pastures." 59 

then slowly, creakily, oxen or horses travel 
to the bam. 

It is all gone. The meadow is stripped 
of its glory and its beauty, and has 
yielded its sweetness to the apparent 
destroyer. Yet in so doing it is fulfilling 
its mission, — ministering to man and 
beast, and in reality becoming valuable, 
while preparing also for future usefulness. 
Nor does it long bear the traces of the 
destructive process. Soon the little heads 
of clover and grass lift themselves, and 
cheerily wave in the breeze ; and all the 
evidence left of the change that has 
passed over the field is the smoother, 
fresher aspect of the ^^ green pastures." 

But what of the ^^ green pastures " of 
the soul, whereof the Psalmist speaks? 
The Good Shepherd's leading, — is it 
always where the green is perennial and 
the comfort and joy unbroken? The 
Psalmist saw many a time in his life 



6o ''In Green Pastures.'" 

when outward events seemed all against 
him ; when he was stripped of what he 
valued and desired ; when ambition and 
affection and possessions were laid low : 
yet he sang continually of the God of 
his salvation, his Refuge, his Rock, his 
Good Shepherd, who led him into *^ green 
pastures." Looking at David's life and 
David's words, written for all those who 
should come after him with the same 
experiences and the same needs, how 
can any child of God fail to recognize, 
even when clouds and darkness are 
round about him, that the sweet green 
pastures of the Father's love are just 
behind or beyond them, and that the 
Father's hand is leading him into them 
'^ by the right way"? 

Look up, weary one, and see if close 
beside you there is not a place of rest 
and comfort and sweetness for your 
soul, into which a little faith and trust 



"In Green Pastures.'' 6i 

in the infinite love, which is yours, will 
lead you. You will " not want '* when 
you find yourself safely there, for the 
Shepherd of your soul will feed you and 
lead you continually into His own ^^ green 
pastures." 



^^THOU BECAMEST MINE." 

" If we ever get to heaven, I suppose 
we shall know about all these things," 
said my friend Priscilla, one day, as we 
sat talking of some of the mysteries of 
life. 

"If we ever get to heaven?" I re- 
peated. "Why, have you any doubt of 
our getting there?" 

"Why, certainly," she said, "I do 
not suppose any of us can be sure of it, 
I think you will get there, but I am not 
at all certain of myself. I only hope that 
I shall." 

" Well," I answered, " it seems to me 
that that is doubting God. If we ex- 
pected to get to heaven by anything that 
we do or become, then we might be 



''Thou Becamest Mine,'' 63 

uncertain. But if Christ, our Saviour, is 
going to bring us there by our just giving 
ourselves to Him and trusting Him to do 
it, — and this is what God says is the 
truth about it, — then it looks to me like 
a doubt of Him to say that perhaps, after 
all, He may not do as He says He will." 

" But / have something to do too, and 
maybe I am not doing it as I ought. I 
am very far from being holy and fit for 
heaven." 

^'Yes. And where does God say in 
His Word that before we can go to our 
Father^s House we must, by our own 
methods, and according to our own view, 
make ourselves ready to be there ? How 
long had the thief on the cross to get 
himself prepared for heaven?" 

Well, we did not talk very long about 
this matter, for Priscilla had to go home 
to her husband and children. After she 
went, however, I followed her in my 



64 '' Thou Becamest Mine," 

thoughts, because of what we had been 
talking about ; and it occurred to me that 
many others feel very much as she does 
on this subject of getting to heaven. So 
I bethought me that perhaps a word of 
what seems to me a truer and happier 
view of the question might not be amiss. 
My friend Priscilla has been a happy, 
honored wife for some twenty years or 
more. How, I wonder, would it have 
seemed to her husband if, when they had 
been married five years, she had said to 
him one day, " This is all very well so 
far. You have been a good, kind, faith- 
ful husband, and have abundantly fulfilled 
all your promises to me. I have not 
been as perfect a wife to you as I wish to 
be, yet I do love you and trust in you. 
But how about these years of life together 
which stretch out before us? How can 
I be sure that you will continue to love 
and protect and care for me? " 



'' Thou Becamest Mine," 65 

The husband might answer, "Why, I 
promised to do these things until death 
shall part us, did I not? Why should 
yoa doubt me now, when I have shown 
you my will to keep all the vows which I 
made when you became mine? Are my 
promises, confirmed by my conduct thus 
far towards you, worth nothing? " 

And if my friend continued to doubt 
and fear for her future as a wife, would 
not her husband have reason to feel hurt 
and grieved by her lack of faith in him 
and his love toward her? 

It seems to me that this is a faint, 
poor illustration of our attitude towards 
God, when we insist upon doubting 
whether, after all, we shall ever see our 
"Heavenly Home." We have '^\% prom- 
ise, repeated in many forms of expression, 
absolute and emphatic as words can be, 
given simply on the one condition of our 
resting our souls on Christ, — or, in other 
5 



66 " Thou Becamest Mine.*' 

words, believing that Christ died for us, 
and that He will save us if we just trust 
to Him to do it. 

So it is not we ourselves who are to be 
trusted, or whose steadfastness is in ques- 
tion. If it were, then indeed we might 
tremble and fear, and doubt whether the 
pearly gates would ever open to admit us 
into heaven. But, thanks be to our Saviour, 
He says of those whom He calls and who 
"hear His voice," *'They shall never per- 
ish, neither shall any pluck them from 
My hand." Falling, fainting, stumbling, 
only weak and unworthy in itself, yet 
ever *' hearing His voice," the sheep has 
this assurance from the One who has the 
power to bring it safe through all peril 
and all wandering to Himself. Can it 
then be pleasing to Him for us to be 
always doubting whether He can or will 
do it, forgetting or discrediting His prom- 
ises, and letting an " if " come in be- 



" Thou Becamest Mine.'' 67 

tween our going to be '^ with Him where 
Heis?^' 

Among the very blessed words of the 
Old Testament are those at the head of 
this article, "Thou becamest Mine;" 
and again, " Fear not ; I have redeemed 
thee ; thou art Mine.'' Surely we cannot 
believe that such words are said with the 
possibility always at hand that God's own 
may be taken from Him, and His " Fear 
not " prove a delusion and disappoint- 
ment to the soul which He thus claims 
and comforts. 

You have become His by doing just what 
He tells you ; namely, trusting in Jesus 
Christ, His Son, for salvation. So trust- 
ing. He bids you have no fear. Through 
this wilderness world, He is going to lead 
you safely ; by His gentle or severe disci- 
pline. He is going to refine and purify 
you, keeping close to you all the while ; 
and when your place in those blessed 



6S 



Thou Becamest Mine.'' 



mansions is ready for you, and you are 
ready for it, He has said that He will 
"come again and receive you to Himself.'* 
Having actually promised you all this, 
how does it seem for you to doubt and 



hesitate and 



say, 



If I ever get to 



heaven"? You have not got to bring 
yourself there ; Christ is going to bring 
you ! Do you not think it must grieve 
Him to have you distrust His will or His 
power to do what He has promised ? 

Oh, rest your whole weight upon Him ! 
Do not give Him a half-trust with a fear 
behind it ; but let Him take you just as 
you are, do with you what He will, and 
be sure that He will bring you safely 
" where He is." For you are His, He 
has called you by your name^ and none 
can take you from Him. 



OPPORTUNITIES. 

" Mother, Mrs. M was here to-day 

while you were out." 

" Was she ? It was a warm day for 
her to come so far. I hope you asked 
her to step in and rest before she went 
home?" 

" Well, no, I did not. I was reading, 
and I never thought of it." 

" Oh, I am so sorry, my dear ; for you 
lost an opportunity y 

This was the kind of teaching which 
one of New England's royal women gave 
to her children a quarter of a century 
ago. Have those children ever forgotten 
the teaching ? Could they ever forget it ? 
I think not. The hearing of it at second 
or third hand made a deep impression 



70 Opportunities, 

upon my mind. I only wish it would 
always bear the fruit which should grow 
from such planting. 

But since I heard this, I have oftener 
thought of the whole subject of opportu- 
nities than I did before. The other day, 
in the cars, a child wanted a seat by the 
window, and I had one at my disposal. 
The not over-clean little girl belonged 
to a party of working-people, who were 
evidently going on a picnic somewhere, 
and to whom such pleasures were not 
common occurrences ; probably a ride 
in the cars was a quite unusual treat to 
the child. Well, I was comfortable, and 
I avoided giving her the seat by the 
window; and by some changes among 
themselves the party managed to place 
the little girl by a window. But — I lost 
an opportunity ! 

It haunted me for hours afterwards, 
that I had had the chance to do a kind 



opportunities. 71 

act, — in fact, I was silently asked to do 
it, — and I voluntarily missed the offered 
opportunity. I wish I might never do 
the like again. It was a little thing, — 
indeed, hardly worth a thought; but 
then how different to ourselves and to 
others would our lives be, if in little 
things especially (for that is where we 
are constantly missing it), we should 
never lose an opportunity to show kind- 
ness, to give help, to brighten life ! 
Surely, we should thus be walking much 
more closely in the footprints of our 
Divine Master than we are now. 

If at the close of any one day we could 
faithfully bring up to our view the oppor- 
tunities for doing good which we have 
honestly improved, and those which we 
have simply passed by blindly or in- 
differently, during the day, we should 
most of us be surprised at the feeble 
show which the former would make by 



72 opportunities, 

the side of the latter. *'Do good unto 
all, as ye have opportunity." '^ Inas- 
much as ye have done it unto one of 
the least of these, ye have done it unto 
Me." Oh, if we could but begin our 
days, and go through the hours of each 
one, with this command and this high 
motive not only in our hearts, but girding 
our loins and sandalling our feet and fill- 
ing our hands, how would the world 
speedily see it, and '' take knowledge of 
us that we have been with Jesus, and 
learned of Him!" How would empty 
lives be full, hungering and thirsting souls 
be satisfied, with the blessings that would 
follow the simple use of opportunities I 



(( 



THIS IS OUR REFRESHING." 



How tired we get of ourselves some- 
times ! Especially when we have had 
half a century or so of those same selves, 
and during a large part of that time have 
been trying to get some undesirable 
things out of them, and to put some 
good things into them. Did you never 
wish, reader, that you could just escape 
outside of yourself for a little while, and 
have a good time of freedom from the 
old familiar foes that know you so well 
and attack you so freely? If we could 
only get into somebody else's skin — be 
somebody else — for even a single day, 
and fight the old battle on a little differ- 
ent ground, we imagine that it would be 
a sort of rest. 



74 "' This is Our Refreshing^ 

It is such a wearisome kind of warfare, 
this daily, hourly, constant resisting the 
'^ evil that we would not do,'' and so 
often finding that, in spite of our stout 
*^ would not," we have done just that 
very thing, — the thing that we ^' hate " 
while we do it. (Blessed, comforting 
Saint Paul ! how we thank him for so 
exactly describing our troubles as his 
own !) The sense of real, complete, 
triumphant victory comes so seldom, and 
is so frequently followed by the humilia- 
tion of defeat, that we scarcely realize 
the "overcoming" which is truly on the 
whole taking place. 

If you who read this have never had 
any of this impatience with, and disgust 
at, self, then you have either an unusually 
placid or indifferent or sanctified nature 
controlling your soul. If it be the first 
or the last, be thankful and look with 
compassion on the struggles of others less 



*' This is Our Refreshing." 75 

blessed than you are. But if your case 
be that of indifference, then beware lest 
sometime a flash from eternity's light 
reveal yourself to you in a new aspect, 
and you suddenly perceive that ease 
has meant bondage and peace, the quiet 
weaving of innumerable chains about your 
soul. Better any amount of fighting than 
that ! 

Our friends, perhaps, sometimes grow 
impatient with us, wondering why we do 
not correct certain annoying faults or 
disturbing dispositions. Do they know 
how much greater is our own surprise 
at this very thing? Of course, when 
they see such small results it is not 
strange that they conclude the effort to 
be small, unless they have a little some- 
thing in their own experience which they 
will allow to guide them in their judg- 
ment. But we ourselves cannot always 
understand why, after ten, twenty, thirty 



76 " This is Our Refreshing.'' 

years of resistance to some besetting sin, 
it still seems to rear its head so defiantly 
and put forth such power over us. And 
if our criticising friends only knew how 
we hate and dread it, they would pity 
oftener than they blame us. 

Well, we cannot get rid of, or get out- 
side of, these troublesome selves. There 
were those a few years ago who told us 
complacently, ^^ Oh, yes, you can. Just 
get out of yourself and into Christ ; let 
Him fight your battles, and you need 
have no more trouble, no more strug- 
gling, no more sin." Some of us were 
lulled to sleep by these words ; some 
of us were roused to anxiety ; while most 
of us settled down to the conviction that 
we, at least, should never get beyond Saint 
Paul's experience, — that of not having 
" attained " or " become perfect ; " of 
always having to be careful "lest Satan 
get an advantage over " us ; of never 



'' This is Our Refreshing.'' 77 

being quite able to "do the things that 
we would.'' That Christ, our Master and 
Lord, is with us in all this long conflict, 
making the victorious end certain and the 
crown of hfe the sure reward, is our glory 
and our joy; but that He so does our 
fighting that we can be out of it all in 
a sort of charmed circle, looking on, 
but feeling no wound or pain, is not in 
God's Word or in the ordinary Christian's 
experience. 

Now, "this is the refreshing," in all 
such weariness of self and its sin and 
weakness ; and it is like withdrawing from 
a scene of noise and turmoil to sit down 
by a quiet, rippling stream, under the 
deep shade of a great tree, with a soft 
breeze blowing on the hot brow, while 
gentle, loving words from some one 
mighty to help and to save fall upon the 
ear. Listen. 

" Not having mine own righteousness^ 



78 " This is Our Refreshing.'' 

which is of the law, but that which is 
through the faith oi Christo" Jesus — 
^' He shall save His people from their 
sins." " The Lord will perfect that 
which concerneth me." *^Who shall also 
confirm you unto the end, that ye may 
be blameless in the day of our Lord 
Jesus Christ." '^Thanks be to God, 
which giveth us the victory through our 
Lord Jesus Christ." '^ Put on the whole 
armor of God, that ye may be able to 
stand." ^^The Lord hath laid on Him 
the iniquity of us all." " Let us run 
with patience the race which is set 
before us, looking unto Jesus." 

With these and many, many other 
equally precious words, shall we not try 
to be patient with ourselves, weak and 
wavering and sinful as we are? For 
some day "we shall be changed, — in 
a moment, in the twinkling of an eye ; " 
and then the weariness will all be gone, — 



"' This is Our Refreshing.''' 79 

we shall be " glorious within ; '^ we shall 
be like Him, for we shall see Hitn as He 
is," and be "changed into the same 
image." 

Surely, no more " refreshing " thoughts 
than these can come to us in our earthly 
pilgrimage, when we grow utterly weary 
of self and of sin. 



BROKEN THINGS. 

I HAD to wait fifteen or twenty minutes 
the other day in a curious place ; and it 
made an impression upon me, which I 
could not at once shake off. Out of it 
finally grew some thoughts that have 
forced their way to paper. As I sat in 
the store and looked about me, I saw 
nothing but what had been, or was then, 
more or less dilapidated. Nothing was 
perfect. Some things were terribly marred 
and defaced ; others only very slightly 
nijured. Others again were so restored 
by careful hands that one could only 
judge by their presence in so heterogene- 
ous a collection and behind glass doors, 
apart from their fellows, that misfortune 
had overtaken them and repair become 



Broken Things. 8i 

necessary. Many of the articles* were 
very beautiful, while a few were so plain, 
and one would think of so little value, 
that the ash- heap would have been a 
more suitable place than this for them. 
Chairs, tables, shelves, and floor were 
covered with the odd collection, so that 
one had to move carefully to avoid doing 
mischief among them. 

I could not but think how many care- 
less hands had been busy in making all 
this havoc, — how Bridget had come with 
the pieces in her grasp to tell the story of 
the pitcher having '' jist come right apart 
in me hands, mum ; " or how the pretty 
cup or glass had been pushed back upon 
the shelf, out of sight, to be discovered 
cracked or mutilated, though no one 
could be found who had touched it; or 
how the glass dish, an heirloom in the 
family, had by one rude, hasty movement 
gone crashing upon the floor, smiting the 
6 



82 Broken Things, 

ears of the mistress in the parlor with 
dismay and wonder as to what had gone 
now ! How many scoldings and tears 
and vain regrets, perhaps angry blows; 
what a fearful amount of "awkwardness 
and brute force ; " what a tremendous 
demand on the grace of patience and for- 
bearance, — would enter into the history 
of the contents of this room ! And how 
easily all this mischief was done ! How 
much harder and slower the process of 
repair ! 

Then I thought, as I looked around 
me, how like to this array of broken 
things, brought to be restored, if possible, 
to beauty and usefulness, are the human 
souls on every hand in this great work- 
shop world ! Not one is what it once 
was, or what it ought to be, according to 
its Maker's original design and purpose. 
Some are terribly changed from that first 
state, broken in will-power and weakened 



Broken Things, Z^ 

in purposes of right, with years of pre- 
cious time gone forever, and dark lines 
running all over the surface of life's his- 
tory. Others of these souls show less of 
the evil effect of the world's use of them. 
Yet all must pass through the Restorer's 
hands before they can become *^fit for 
the Master's use." Among these things 
in this shop, where all this time I am 
lingering, are some large, elegant vases 
and jars, which have great pieces broken 
out of them ; and looking at the gaping 
holes and jagged edges, one might ex- 
claim, '' What valuable things ! But what 
a difficult thing it will be to mend them ! '* 
But the mender says, " You are mistaken. 
This tiny cup, with its almost invisible 
injury, is more rare and costly than one 
of those great vases, and will take far 
more time and skill in the mending." 
Yes ; and this is true also of these souls of 
which we are thinking. That one whose 



84 Broken Things. 

career is so conspicuous, and whose sins 
are so glaring, may be more easily reached 
and renewed, in inward and in outward 
life, than the one whose long habit of 
evil, hidden from the world under a fair, 
smooth exterior, has penetrated and per- 
meated the whole spiritual nature. 

It is a good thing that there is a place 
whither all these damaged articles (of 
value to their owners, or they would not 
be here) can be brought, and a man who 
has the skill and patience to restore them. 
And then, turning to the deeper thought 
of the moment, comes the joyful thanks- 
giving that in all this multitude of marred 
souls around us, there is not one which 
cannot be restored to far more than its 
original beauty, no matter how ruined 
and defaced it may be. It need only be 
brought in all its ruin to Him who made 
it in the first place, who knows all about 
it ever since its creation, and who will at 



Broken Things. 85 

last, if it is put wholly in His hands, 
"present "it "faultless before the pres- 
ence of His glory." 

A practical thought grows out of all 
this. These poor, sinful, ruined souls are 
all about us, far and near. Can we not, 
oftener than we do, reach out a saving 
hand and gently lead them to the Great 
Restorer, — the Redeemer who has paid 
the price of His own precious blood that 
they and we may become pure and whole, 
even as He made us to be? 



NO FURTHER- 

A SEASIDE THOUGHT. 

Listening to the sound of the surf 
breaking upon the shore, somethnes m 
the stillness of the night, when it seemed 
to come very close to our abode, the old 
familiar words from the Book of Job 
have constantly been in my mind, — 
"Hitherto shalt thou come, and no 
further, and here shall thy proud waves 
be stayed." How mighty the invisible 
Hand which fixes those limits and holds 
back the " proud waves " which would 
so surely carry destruction with them if 
unrestrained ! 

It is law, indeed, which governs them 
and sets the bounds which they cannot 
pass ; but it is none the less God who 



No Further. 87 

established and maintains that law. It 
seems a strange reasoning on the part 
of some students of nature which leads 
them to accept a creation, but no Creator ; 
a systematic plan, but no Designer; 
a law, but no Lawgiver ; obedient hosts, 
but no Commander. The more deeply 
such men penetrate into the mysteries 
of the universe, and the more fully they 
discover and reveal its secrets, the more 
clearly should we expect them to see and 
recognize the living, personal Almighty 
One behind and in them all. Alas ! that 
they so often fail to do this, and insist 
on holding up to the world's reverent 
admiration the works of God, while clos- 
ing eyes and heart to the vision of Him 
which they contain, — if, indeed, they do 
not openly and emphatically deny His 
existence ! 

^* No further," says the Lord of the 
^^ proud waves;" and we build our 



SS No Further. 

houses and our towns along the coast, 
with the cahn assurance that if the sand- 
formed soil is washed away or gathered 
in new heaps, the change will be so 
gradual that there will be ample time 
to follow its guidance and obey its hmita- 
tions. And when once in long periods 
a mighty tidal wave or furious storm 
seems to overleap all bounds and bar- 
riers, we know that it is still held by the 
hand of Omnipotence, and that " hith- 
erto and no further " is yet uttered over 
its wild sweep. 

But our seaside thought by no means 
ends here, or we should lose what is to 
us its best strength and comfort. For 
it is not only in the so-called world of 
nature that the "hitherto and no further" 
of Omnipotence is felt. The daily ebb 
and flow of our hfe's history, with all 
that it brings to us or bears away from 
us, is measured and controlled by the 



No Further, 89 

same Almighty Hand, with unfaiHng love 
and unfaltering wisdom. Each experi- 
ence of trial, every attack of temptation, 
with the rich joys which enter into the life 
of the child of God, — all are bounded by 
the limitations which He has set to them, 
knowing just what part they have to bear 
in the formation of character for eternity. 
And when great waves of sorrow and 
anguish roll over the soul, and it would 
seem as if faith and hope and joy were 
gone out of sight forever, then comes the 
calm voice from out the storm, saying, 
'^ The waters shall not overflow thee ; " 
'' Fear not, neither be thou dismayed; " 
'^ I am with thee ; '* *^ I will not leave 
you comfortless." 

Ah, in all these experiences the 
'^hitherto and no further" is spoken! 
The temptation is not ^' beyond what we 
are able to bear." The trial lasts no 
longer and goes no deeper than is neces- 



90 No Further. 

sary to purify the precious metal. Even 
lawful joy is not allowed to have absolute 
possession too long, lest the soul forget 
that this world is not its home. Nor 
does the crushing bereavement or long- 
continued sorrow rob Hfe of a// that 
makes it worth the living, being usually 
held at a point far short of that, by the 
hand of God. 

We must surely believe also, in carry- 
ing out this thought, that the power of 
disease over the earthly tabernacle of 
God^s child is governed by this same 
law. It may seem to work its way un- 
checked, and to be hmited by no bound- 
ary except the grave, yet He who when 
on earth held sway over diseases must 
still so control them that they shall work 
good and not evil to those whom He 
calls His own. And at what we igno- 
rantly call the wof^st, when human means 
— which, after all, be it remembered, 



No Further. 91 

are also God's instrumentalities — are 
exhausted, and the weakened body yields 
to the foe with which it has been bat- 
tling, then in their truest, deepest mean- 
ing may the words be repeated, as the 
very utterance of Jehovah to death and 
the grave, — *^ Hitherto shalt thou come, 
and no further ! '*'' 

Beyond that point their power ceases, 
their course is stayed. Up to a certain 
limit they have been allowed some 
dominion, — they have come and gone, 
advanced and receded, and held their 
own undisputed ground, subject only to 
the higher, mightier control of the King 
of the Universe, the Lord of Life and 
Death. But in each individual case of 
a soul entering into Paradise, and some 
day to the whole world, that is all over. 
Its limit has come; "no further" can 
the power of death go, for the Word of 
God has spoken it, — " He that believeth 



92 No Further, 

in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he 
live." 

What a rock upon which to stay our 
souls, in the midst of the waves and 
tumults around us, is this Word of God ! 
Nothing can pass His *^ hitherto.'/ His 
"no further" binds the power of Satan 
himself; and we are the "apple of His 
eye," those whom He has called and 
chosen, and whom none shall pluck from 
His hand. Are we not, then, supremely, 
eternally safe? 



A PARADOX OF SAINT PETER. 

What is this that thou sayest, Peter? 
*^ Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though 
now for a season, if need be, ye are in 
heaviness through manifold temptations.*' 
Great rejoicing and heaviness in the 
same breath? How can we be glad 
and sorrowful, uplifted and downcast, 
light-hearted and heavy-hearted, at the 
same moment? Will not one of these 
spirits, taking possession, instantly or 
inevitably expel the other? And is it 
not, therefore, cruel mockery to tell those 
who are in ^^ heaviness " that they must 
^^ greatly rejoice," notwithstanding that 
the cause of their trouble is not yet to 
be removed? 

Verily it might be so, if it were not 
that Peter and his '^beloved" and we 



94 A Paradox of Saint Peter. 

ourselves have all come into the kingdom 
and under the sway of a wonderful system 
of grace. Outside of that it would indeed 
seem like heartless mocking to tell people 
that 'Mying, they live," "alone, they 
are not alone," " sorrowful, always rejoic- 
ing," "troubled, yet not distressed," "in 
heaviness," they are still in great joy. 
But where is the Christian who has for 
years followed in his Master's footsteps, 
drinking even in sm.all measure of the 
cup that He drank of, who does not know 
that these are not mocking words, but 
that they express a most blessed reality? 
If there be such an one, he has yet to 
learn one of the very simplest and 
sweetest lessons in his Master's school. 

For see '^wherein'" it is that Peter 
says we have such gladness. Looking in 
the direction to which that " wherein " 
points, we speedily perceive the reason 
why none of the "manifold temptations" 



A Paradox of Saint Peter. 95 

and trials among which we live can keep 
from us the joy which is also and 
unchangeably ours. It is an " incorrupt- 
ible inheritance that fadeth not away, 
reserved jn heaven for us," which is the 
source and secret of our great rejoicing. 
What sure elements of joy are there ! 
Nothing can defile or destroy this bHssful 
heritage. It has eternal foundations and 
holds everlasting promise, and it is pre- 
served for us by the " hand that bled to 
make it ours," and from which no foe 
can ever pluck what it would hold. 

Do you say ^^Yes, but my joy must 
ever be chastened by the fickleness of 
my own faith and the torturing doubt 
whether, after all, I shall attain unto this 
heritage of bliss"? Well, so determined 
is your Lord that you shall have no hin- 
drance to your rejoicing, that He goes on 
to tell you, through the pen of His apostle, 
that not only is this inheritance reserved 



g6 A Paradox of Saint Peter, 

for you, but that for it you are " kept by 
the power of God through faith unto 
salvation." You have not to keep your- 
self; you cannot. You are to be " kept " 
by the mightiest power in the universe, — 
the one which controls, and guides and 
employs all others in the ultimate doing 
of His will by the armies of heaven and 
among the inhabitants of the earth. 
Simply trusting in Him by faith and 
yielding yourself to His care, His power 
is pledged to hold you safe and bring you 
at last into that full, complete salvation 
which you inherit as a " joint heir with 
Christ." What more can you ask? The 
inheritance kept secure for you, and you 
protected and guided until you reach and 
possess it, — surely no child could ask 
more of a father, no subject of a king. 
Forgiven Peter knew well what it was 
to be tempted and overcome by sin, to 
have his Lord turn and look upon him 



A Paradox of Saint Peter, 97 

with infinite love, but deep sadness, and 
to go out and weep broken-hearted tears. 
He knew too what it was to come back 
to a consciousness of his fellowship with 
his Master, unbroken even by his great 
sin, to Hsten to that gentle voice, in 
its threefold questioning as to his love, 
and then to receive the command to go 
and show that love by service. And so 
he bids God's chosen ones, to whom he 
speaks in his Master's name, to '^rejoice 
greatly," though they are often tempted 
with ^^ manifold temptations," though they 
fall and must bitterly repent again, and 
though this experience causes ^^ heaviness " 
for a season. 

It is but a sort of passing shadow over 
the soul, this sinning and repenting, 
when the sin is honestly hated and re- 
sisted. Through it all the sunlight of the 
coming joy streams into and pervades the 
being. Not always, not long-continued, 
7 



98 A Paradox of Saint Peter. 

not abiding, is the heaviness. Only " for 
a season/' and only " if need be." And 
it should never so weigh upon our spirits 
or so becloud our vision that we lose 
sight of our inheritance, or distrust the 
being '' kept through faith " that is our 
sure possession. 

Most of us grow very tired of our " sin 
which doth so easily beset us," and some- 
times we have a keen sense of defeat in 
our warfare with it. But let us hold fast 
to our ^^ lively hope," and remember that 
this faith of ours, which is being ^Hried," 
is something " precious " in the sight of 
him who will bring it " unto praise and 
honor and glory at the appearing of 
Jesus Christ." How small and transient 
will these times of heaviness appear to us 
one day, when we have " received the 
end of our faith, even the salvation of 
our souls," in full, triumphant measure, 
seeing face to face the blessed Master 



A Paradox of Saint Peter. 99 

" whom, having not seen, we love ; and 
in whom, though now we see Him not, yet 
beheving, we rejoice with joy unspeakable 
and full of glory." 



AN OLD CRADLE. 

There was nothing remarkable about 
this particular wooden cradle ; there are 
hundreds like it to be found in attics or 
lumber-rooms all over the country. Nor 
do I know who slept in it in his or her 
baby days. I imagine it is a great many 
years since it rocked any baby to sleep. 
It was the somewhat curious use to which 
it was put that attracted me and gave 
me some thoughts which have stayed with 
me, asking to be handed on to some one 
else, to whom perchance they may sug- 
gest comfort or help. 

Driving along an unfamUiar road in 
this beautiful country, where for a time 
we have taken up our abode, we stopped 
to ask our way at a house by the road- 



An Old Cradle. loi 

side. It was a pretty, tidy-looking place, 
with many flowers growing in the little 
front yard and around the house. And 
just there was this particular old cradle. 
It stood among flowers of various kinds 
and was itself filled with growing plants, 
mainly fuchsias. 

I fancied I could imagine how it came 
to be there fulfilling that oflice, although 
my imagination had nothing whatever 
to base itself upon. Yet it was not, after 
all, an unhkely thing that the mistress of 
the house, loving flowers with a love 
which would not rest without having 
all she could get to satisfy it, had hap- 
pened one day to see in her attic this 
old cradle, and at once thought of it as 
a possible receptacle for some of her 
beloved plants. So she would bring it 
down, first emptying it of the bundles 
and odds and ends that had been de- 
posited there, and set it in her garden. 



102 An Old Cradle, 

Then she filled it with earth and planted 
her graceful fuchsias in it, with a few 
small white flowers below, and was glad 
thus to utilize the old cradle and give 
her plants a place wherein to grow and 
prosper. 

I think that cradle must have had a 
little history of its own, not worth re- 
cording or even recalling probably, but 
yet a small story of a mother's hopes and 
joys, — perhaps also, alas ! fears and sor- 
rows, as it was watched over with unshed 
tears and aching heart, and then put 
away in a corner to be unused for a time 
because the little form which had filled it 
was to be laid under the daisies. How 
the little faces that had looked up from 
this cradle had been kissed and crooned 
over, and their every change showing 
the awakening mind noted and enjoyed ! 
I think more than one generation of 
baby charms and baby woes had been 



An Old Cradle, 103 

held within the embrace of this old 
cradle before its legitimate occupation 
was gone. 

But my thought about all this has gone 
deeper. Out of this emptied, disused 
cradle were growing beauty and sweet- 
ness, living and blessing those who cared 
to look upon it. Not often, perhaps, 
would precisely this use be made of an 
old cradle, nor would it be desirable to 
fill our gardens with such gatherings 
from our attics. Yet there is a lesson 
hidden within this one as it stands there, 
for many a woman, if she will but open 
her eyes to see it. Everywhere there 
are some empty cradles in the house 
or in the heart. Some were never filled 
at all, but have always stood wait- 
ing, waiting, for the treasure which in- 
finite wisdom has held back from them. 
Others have been filled and emptied 
long ago, so that only sweet, tender 



I04 An Old Cradle. 

memories cling about them now. Still 
others have but lately yielded up their 
darlings, either to the Good Shepherd's 
arms or to the natural going out into 
boyhood or girlhood life. 

In whatever way these cradles have 
been made empty, may they not be filled 
with some living, blessed ministry of 
love? Need they stand forever empty, 
because the treasures they were meant 
to hold no longer fill them ? My old 
cradle in the garden says, " No. Put 
the seed of some loving act or word 
gained from the memory of what has 
been, or the thought of what might have 
been, into that vacant place, and blos- 
soms of blessing and joy to others will 
reward the sowing." Try it, you who 
look sadly at that which is gone or al- 
together missed out of your life. Fill 
the empty space with ministries which 
shall gladden and benefit some fellow- 



An Old Cradle. 105 

beings in this world of need, and your 
sometime emptiness may be full to over- 
flowing with the sweetness and beauty of 
service for the Master, and bright with 
the joy of His smile. 



SECRET THINGS. 

Moses had, at the command of God, 
been reminding the children of Israel of 
the wasting and destruction which would 
surely follow their disobedience of God 
and their turning from Him to the gods of 
the heathen round about them. It is a 
terrible picture of punishment and desola- 
tion which Moses was bidden ever and 
anon to hold up before this weak and 
wayward people, as the sure consequence 
of their sin, if they persisted in it. So 
terrible is it, that we can well imagine 
the question arising in many a mind 
among them, if not in Moses' own heart, 
why, why should such wrath visit children 
from a Father's hand? Does this sound 
like a God of love, a God who is called 
"long-suffering," "forgiving," "merciful," 



Secret Things. 107 

^^ gracious/' "pitiful," "not willing that 
any should perish," " a God that par- 
doneth iniquity " ? Other words, indeed, 
which are too often forgotten, such as, 
"who will by no means clear the guilty," 
accompany these expressions of tender- 
ness, yet is it not hard to reconcile the 
character thus given to God with the 
awful penalties here attached to sin? 
What earthly father would so utterly cast 
oif even a disobedient child ? 

It almost seems as if it were in answer 
to such questionings, uttered or unex- 
pressed, that Moses calmly says, " The 
secret things belong unto the Lord our 
God, but those which are revealed be- 
long unto us." As if, inspired by God, 
he would say to the impatient questioners, 
" Do not seek to look into these mysteries 
of God's government over His creatures ; 
we are not equal to the understanding of 
them, nor have we any right to ask ex- 



io8 Secret Things. 

planation. They belong to God, while 
to us belongs just what He in His wisdom 
chooses to reveal, to the end that we may 
be obedient and faithful to Him." 

Do we not need this lesson to-day as 
truly as did the chosen people of old? 
Oh, the mysteries, the bewilderments, the 
questionings connected with this human 
life of ours ! We cannot set ourselves to 
look in the face one of the great prob- 
lems of our being, without coming shortly 
to the end of our knowledge, where a 
blank wall of ignorance rises close before 
us, impenetrable, insurmountable. 

And as for God, — try for one moment 
to grasp with the utmost effort of your 
mind the thought of a Being who never 
had a beginning. You find yourself un- 
equal to the task; it staggers and con- 
fuses you. If you have never had the 
sudden, tremendous realization of the 
strange mystery and complexity of this 



Secret Things. 109 

world of ours, with so much apparent 
independence of any higher Power, while 
yet subject to laws made by some Power 
beyond itself, and ever and again com- 
pelled to feel the weight of that unseen 
Hand, — if you have never at least for an 
instant felt all this and much more like it, 
you must have been singularly indifferent 
to what is going on around you. 

This concerns no theory or theology 
or system of belief. It is simply the fact 
of mystery all about and around us, an 
atmosphere as real as the material one 
in which we live, and one which our finite, 
body-enclosed minds can penetrate only 
a very little way. Why? Because the 
" secret things " — the mysteries — '^ be- 
long to God," and not to us; and not 
belonging to us, naturally, we cannot un- 
derstand them. 

There is nothing in all this that should 
trouble or distress us ; on the contrary, 



no Secret Things, 

there is everything to comfort and 
strengthen us, as we face life's problems ; 
for just so much as is needful or best for 
us, nay, so much as we are capable of 
understanding, is revealed, and " belongs 
unto us." And how much is thus un- 
folded, and, therefore, is our own ! 

When your soul is overwhelmed by the 
mystery of human existence and its rela- 
tions to God, and the darkness seems 
thick before you, go to the blessed Book 
which reveals the things that " belong to 
us." See how all that really and truly 
does so belong is made plain and clear, 
so that we " need not err therein." It 
constantly, indeed, touches on what is 
beyond us, and so ^- belongs to God ; " 
but, looking simply and honestly for what 
is revealed and thus legitimately ours, we 
shall find its pages full of unspeakable 
comfort and help for just such puzzled, 
short-sighted, ignorant creatures as we are. 



Secret Things, m 

Some foolish people, and not a few 
wise ones also, are forever trying to get 
at God's " secret things." They boldly 
undertake to say why God has done thus 
and so, what plans and purposes lie back 
of the simple statements of His Word, and 
applying their own weak logic and scant 
knowledge to these deep matters, they 
attempt to wrest some of the "secret 
things" from His keeping. 

But in vain. He holds them still be- 
yond their reach ; and until we come into 
the light above, where " we shall know 
even as we are known," only what "be- 
longs unto us " will really be our posses- 
sion. Surely if we are wise we shall cling 
closely to this precious revelation from God, 
searching it reverently, lovingly, and well, 
while gladly, and in perfect trust, leaving 
the " secret things " with Him to whom 
they belong. 



ARE YOUR WINDOWS WASHED? 

Do not be offended, good housekeeper. 
I do not mean the wmdows of your house, 
which I doubt not Biddy or Sukey washes 
regularly every week, at the imminent 
risk often of dashing out her brains on 
the pavement below. I mean other win- 
dows than these, although these prompted 
the thought which I now bring to you. 

I chanced to look out of my room 
window the other day, when it had just 
been washed after a longer interval than 
usual since the last cleansing, because of 
cold and stormy weather, and I could 
not help noticing the wonderful difference 
in the look of the outer world through 
the cleared glass. I could not only 
see things more distinctly, but everything 



Are Your Windows Washed} 113 

looked so much brighter and more attrac- 
tive to me. I had not noticed before 
that anything was wrong or unpleasant in 
my prospect ; but now I saw how much 
better and more cheerful it could be, with 
no change but that of the medium through 
which I looked at it. 

Then, as I stood there, I thought how 
is it with the windows through which your 
soul looks forth upon the outer world of 
life every day? Are they free from the 
traces of envy, uncharitableness, suspicion, 
and selfishness ? Is the aspect which 
things wear to us never distorted or ob- 
scured because we see, not through 
clear, calm judgment, formed in humiUty, 
but through the medium of some earthly 
passion, uncharitable doubt, or selfish 
ambition? Do not the windows of our 
souls need clearing and purifying from 
these hindrances to perfect vision ? 

Ah, yes, we sigh, they do ; but when are 
8 



114 Are Your Windows Washed? 

we to begin this cleansing, which seems 
so hopeless and tedious a process? And 
is there not a great deal in the world that 
is in itself distorted and dingy and unat- 
tractive, which no possible change in 
our manner of looking at it can make 
otherwise ? 

True ; but even those things would not 
look quite so dark if looked at with the 
bright, steady, far-seeing vision which 
" that Light which lighteth every man 
that cometh into the world " can give us. 
Perhaps many things that now distress 
and perplex us would be more tolerable 
in our sight if we saw them through the 
glass of perfect charity. 

Then as to the magnitude of the task. 
It will not be the best way to undertake 
to make everything all right at one grand 
sweep. It will be better patiently to take 
a little at a time, get rid of a dim suspicion 
here, of a spot of uncharitable judgment 



Are Your Windows Washed} 115 

there, of a selfish or envious streak in one 
place, and a stain of impurity or injustice 
in another. Some spots will take a deal 
of rubbing before they disappear, ay, and 
a deal of praying too. For we must ever 
remember that we have nothing ourselves 
wherewith to cleanse these windows of 
our souls. God must give us the purify- 
ing grace, and enable us to apply it, or 
we shall never look upon life through 
other than a blurred, distorting medium. 

Surely the world would be a better and 
happier place to us did we see everything 
in it with true and honest eyes, through 
the wide windows of a loving charity ! 



''THEM ALSO.'' 
John xvii. 20. 

Did you ever think long of the un- 
speakable comfort of those two little 
words ? How close they bring us — 
you and me — to the Saviour's loving 
heart ! You remember that He spoke 
them only a little while before His de- 
parture from the world. Did He truly 
think of us — you and me — when He 
prayed for His own that day? With His 
intense human agony just in view, with 
the cross and the tomb in sight beyond, 
and, more than all, with the ascension 
glory shining full in His face, did He 
really send a thought down the ages to 
the wanderers over all the earth, who 



'' Them Also." 117 

would turn to Him and lay the burden 
of their sin and sorrow at His feet? Did 
He think of you and me ? 

Yes ; we may clasp that precious truth 
to our hearts, and draw from it strength 
and peace and comfort for our every 
need. Our blessed Master did not offer 
that most wonderful prayer — He took 
pains to tell us that He did not — for 
those alone who heard His human voice, 
and followed His earthly footsteps in 
obedience to His call ; but for " them 
also " — you and me — " who should be- 
lieve on Him " through their word. Who 
does this mean, if not you and me, who 
are believers on Him through w^hat is 
written in Scripture concerning Him? 

This is the simple, precious truth of 
the matter. If you and I believe on 
Him, commit our souls to Him in never 
so weak faith, take Him to our heart 
of hearts as our only Saviour, then He 



ii8 '' Them Also:' 

prayed for us that day ; then He asked 
that we might be one in Him, sharers 
in His Father's love, and partakers of 
the glory to which He was hastening. 

"Them also." He could not forget 
any of His own, whether they were near 
or far, when His sacrifice for them was 
at hand, — when "it " would so soon be 
" finished," and His intercession on high 
begun. Did He not want to assure us 
that we should have a part in that inter- 
cession? And it seems to me that He 
wanted us — you and me, remember — 
to know that all the claim necessary to 
secure that priestly office for ourselves 
is to "believe on" Him. That brings 
us at once into the wide, blessed en- 
closure of " them also." His arms en- 
fold us in the love which was finding 
voice then. His interceding eyes are 
raised to the Father on our behalf. 
Every blessing invoked on any child of 



'' Them Also'' 119 

His — ay, and the blessings and prom- 
ises given in advance to obedient children 
of the old dispensation — all become 
ours, yours and mine, in those two won- 
drous words. 

Surely, then, sore beset by sin, ^' dis- 
couraged because of the way," in any 
strait or need whatever, our souls may 
fly swifdy back to this prayer offered 
for us by the great High Priest, and up 
to the never-ending intercession then 
begun. It is Christ Jesus praying to 
the Father for you and me, then, now, 
always. It was Infinite Love which 
stretched the hand of mercy all down 
the years to ii^s, and embraced us in 
His interceding thought. And the same 
wonderful love saves and heals and 
holds us to-day, — the Love which will 
never let us go until, kept, sanctified, 
made perfect, we shall come at last, in 
accordance with our High Priest's prayer. 



I20 



Them Also, 



to be "with Him where He is** and 
" behold His glory.*' 

<* Them also.'* All this is ours, — 
yours and mine. Let us not fail, from 
ignorance or indifference, to gain from 
these words the comfort and help which 
our dear Lord and Master surely meant 
to give us in them. 



'^ LITTLE CHILDREN." 

The little child ! How it appeals to 
us in its ignorance and inability to 
help or guide itself! How tender we 
are with its weaknesses ! How patient 
with its stumblings by the way ! With 
what delight we watch its growing steadi- 
ness, its firmer hold of things, its fuller 
understanding of life and its demands ! 
How quick we are to hear and heed 
its call, to rescue it from danger, to 
comfort and soothe it in distress ! How 
its suffering hurts us, and how hard it is 
to inflict the pain of needful discipline ! 

May we not read all this, and more, 
in the Master's word and in that of 
His Apostles, when they address their 
followers as "little children"? 



122 ''Little Children^ 

It was directly after our Lord was 
freed from the disturbing presence of the 
betrayer, and when His soul was resting 
and strengthening itself in the knowledge 
of the glory which was '^ straightway " to 
come to Him, that He seemed to turn 
with tenderest love and care to the little 
group about Him, who were to be so 
sorely tried. How the sweet words must 
have fallen on the ears of those rough, 
ignorant, perplexed men, as they in vague 
fear and anxiety gathered around Him on 
that sad evening ! 

" Little children, yet a little while I am 
with you," and then He tells them that 
they cannot now follow where He is 
going, but if they love Him, — if they 
want the world to know that they belong 
to Him, — they must be loving and true 
to one another as well as to Him, and 
some day, *^ afterwards," they shall follow 
Him and be with Him again. 



''Little Children^ 123 

It reminds us of a common, homely 
scene, where a gentle mother, leaving 
her little ones in their nursery for a time, 
while she goes out on household business, 
bids them be peaceful and loving to each 
other during her absence, and promises 
them to come again before very long, and 
take them to be with her where she is. 
What exquisite beauty and tenderness are 
in those few words of our Lord, when we 
unfold and dwell upon them even for a 
moment, in the light of their true, full 
meaning ! 

Nor did the use of the sweet name 
given by Jesus to His followers in that 
touching interview end there. When 
the beloved disciple was writing in His 
Master's name, and under His guidance, 
to churches, he addresses them no less 
than nine times as "little children," or 
" my little children." Read the beauti- 
ful words which are spoken to those thus 



124 ''Little Children^ 

designated. *' My little children, these 
things write I unto you, that ye sin not ; " 
^^I write unto you, little children, be- 
cause your sins are forgiven you for His 
name's sake ; " "I write unto you, little 
children, because ye have known the 
Father;" "Little children, it is the last 
time ; " " Little children, let no man de- 
ceive you;" "And now, little children, 
abide in Him ; " " My litde children, let 
us not love in word, neither in tongue, 
but in deed and in truth;" "Ye are of 
God, little children ; " " Little children, 
keep yourselves from idols." 

How completely are the Christian faith 
and life set forth in these brief sentences, 
and in just such simple, gentle fashion as 
a mother might use to the toddler at her 
knee. The child is not to do wrong ; but 
if it falls into sin, because of its sinful 
nature, it can find forgiveness in Christ's 
name. It can come into knowledge of 



*' Little Children.''' 125 

and communion with the Father ; although 
these are the later days and the time of 
spiritual, not audible communication. 

It must be careful to "prove all things,'^ 
and not be led away by " enticing words 
of man's wisdom." Above all, it must 
abide in Christ, for its life is hid with 
Him in God. It must love with an 
active, hearty, Christ-like spirit. And it 
must let no earthly love or worldly in- 
terest or selfish desire come between 
the soul and the God to whom it owes 
absolute allegiance. Could the little 
children of the Master's care be more 
sweetly taught and strengthened than by 
such words as these? 

It would seem as if our Lord intended 
that just such teaching should serve for 
the greatest and wisest of His followers, 
when He told them that unless they " be- 
came as little children," they should not 
enter the kingdom of heaven. All the 



126 ''Little Children:' 

discussions and arguments and learned 
treatises which the centuries have brought 
concerning the great doctrines of our 
reUgion do not often get much beyond 
these simple foundation truths, written by 
the beloved apostle to the early Christian 
Church, and kept for their successors to 
all time. 

How those first leaders, walking closely 
in their Master's steps, must have loved 
their followers 1 Saint Paul tells his "little 
children " of Galatia that he actually suf- 
fers in the longing that Christ should be 
formed in them, and in the desire to see 
them face to face and be sure of their 
steadfastness. And how Saint John must 
have yearned over those to whom he 
wrote, when he so continually gathers 
them into his arms with the most loving 
address which parental tenderness can 
frame. 

But the infinite love that is back of all 



' ' Little Children, " 127 

this; that led the Father to stoop to 
earth and give Himself to save and bless 
His earthly children ; that inspired all 
the love which shines through gospel and 
epistles ; that will be the life and glory 
of His own through all eternity, — what 
words can adequately speak of that? We 
can only gather as little children at His 
feet, look up into His face, and in our 
hearts say, first, '^ What are we, that Thou 
art so mindful of us?'' and then, "Lord, 
Thou knowest all things ; Thou knowest 
that we love Thee." 



IN SCHOOL. 

I AM in a school. There are many 
other scholars, but the Teacher so sepa- 
rates each from all others that I am to 
Him, and He is to me, as if I were the 
only one. I have my lessons set me day 
by day. None are pointed out to me 
long beforehand, nor have I even an 
intimation of what the unturned pages 
hold. Sometimes an old, familiar lesson 
is again given me to learn. Objecting, I 
say, " Why, I know that ! I learned that 
long ago ! " If I still refuse to take it 
from His hand, my Teacher, in effect, 
says to me, ^'Do you, indeed, know it? 
I will test you." And then the testing 
shows me that I have not yet thoroughly 
learned it, and sadly and humbly I must 



In School. 129 

set myself to study that same page again 
which I thought I knew so well. 

Some of the lessons are hard. I do 
not understand them ; I do not like 
them ; I should like to pass them by. 
Nevertheless, there they are, to be learned, 
and there they are firmly and patiently 
held, until, with willing heart and obedi- 
ent hand, I take them from my Teacher. 
Neglecting them, I should surely some- 
time suffer loss, and my Teacher will not 
let me do that if He can help it. 

To my own eye it often seems as if 
some other task would do me more good, 
would suit me better, than the one set 
before me. I look at what my fellow- 
scholars are doing, and think that if I 
had their place and their lessons, work 
would be easy and pleasant, and I should 
prove myself a better scholar; for, there 
is no doubt about it, I am often slow, 
stupid, and foolish over my lessons. If 
9 



130 In School, 

my Teacher were not wonderfully patient 
and forbearing, as well as wise and watch- 
ful, He could never have borne with my 
dulness and my folly all these years. He 
must surely love me for what He sees 
that I may become under His teaching, 
not for anything that is in me now. 
Only the spark of life which He Himself 
has put into my dull soul proves me to be 
akin to Him. 

I am quite mistaken when I enviously 
regard what others have to do under the 
guidance of our Teacher. My task is 
exactly fitted to me, theirs to them. With 
full knowledge of our capacities and our 
needs ; with comprehension of the future, 
and its, by us, unimagined requirements ; 
with love that would have us perfectly 
holy that we may be perfectly happy, — our 
Teacher makes no mistakes in His appor- 
tionment of tasks. 

Sometimes I am kej>^ in, — not so much, 



In School, 131 

perhaps hardly at all, as a punishment, 
but that I may have a little quiet time to 
study a new lesson, which can only be 
learned when all is still, and I am out of 
the rush and noise of my fellows. I am 
just held quiet, with my Master close 
beside me, while He gives me this new 
teaching. And when I come out from 
these experiences, I am not only richer 
for the lesson that I have learned, but I 
have come nearer to my Teacher's heart 
than I had been before. 

There is discipline in this school. We 
are under a very gentle, but very firm 
Hand. It is heavy when there is need 
for it ; but when it is heaviest, the 
heart of love makes itself felt. Resisting 
it, rebelling against it, we find it able to 
crush and subdue us. Yielding to it, 
clasping it, we find it mighty to defend 
and save us from all real harm. 

Gratitude to my Teacher compels me 



132 In School, 

to say that He gives many rewards all 
along the way, and often scatters flowers 
around, so that the air is full of perfume 
and the school-room bright with color and 
beauty. And if I only keep my face 
turned towards my Teacher and my eyes 
fixed upon Him, I am ever conscious of 
His smile resting upon me, which is in 
itself a joy, for He is '^chiefest among 
ten thousand," and '^ altogether lovely." 

It is my own fault if I sometimes lose 
the sweet consciousness of this smile, but 
my Teacher will soon win me back to it 
again if I do not withstand Him. 

But for what am I in this school ? Why 
all this teaching and training and disci- 
pline? What is to be the outcome of it 
all, — the result ? 

I understand that I am being fitted for 
some service, some abode, some com- 
panionship, for which I was not ready 
when I entered the school. Knowing 



In School. 133 

scarcely anything at all about that place 
and service, I might have thought that I 
needed little preparation, — that just the 
desire to enter, and willingness to go 
through the right door, were enough. 
And in some cases, known to the Lord of 
that abode and the King of that service, 
this is all that is needed here, and the 
training and teaching are done in a heav- 
enly, not in an earthly, school. The 
Teacher knows which is best for every 
one, and will "perfect that which con- 
cerneth '* each in His own way. 

How can I ever do otherwise than with 
joy and faithfulness learn my lessons day 
by day, just as they come to me from my 
Teacher's hand? For "who teacheth 
like Him"? 



"DON'T LET^S FORGET THE 
ONE WE'RE FOLLOWING." 

Making my way through a crowded 
store, with people jostling one another this 
way and that, these words fell upon my 
ear, spoken by one of two who were 
stopped for a moment by some attrac- 
tion on the counter. Evidently they 
were strangers, and were under the guid- 
ance of some one from whom they had 
been temporarily separated in the crowd. 
I did not see the speaker or what became 
of the two ; but the words, forgotten in an 
instant by her who uttered them, repeated 
themselves over and over again to my in- 
ward ear as I went along my way. I 
want now to send them to my fellow- 
pilgrims, linked to the thought of our 



''Don't Let's Forget,'' etc, 135 

Master, who to each of us has said, 
" Follow thou Me ! " 

We are all of us trying to obey this 
command, — rather, to accept this sweet 
invitation. Sometimes it is ^^afar off," 
like the women of old who followed Him 
from Galilee to Jerusalem, and, like them, 
we do not let ourselves lose sight of Him, 
"afar" though we may be. When we 
lift our eyes from earthly things to look 
upon Him, we find Him still mindful of 
us and ready to draw us to Himself with 
blessing. Sometimes the rush of the 
world and its affairs is so strong that the 
vision of His dear face vanishes for a 
time, and then it would seem as if we 
had quite forgotten all about " the One 
we 're following." 

If to us the Master is away in the dis- 
tance, only to meet us perhaps in the time 
of sorrow or the hour of death ; if we are 
missing the familiar ^' fellowship " which 



136 ''Don't Let's Forget;' etc. 

would make Him a sharer in all that 
enters into our life ; if, except in a quiet 
Sabbath hour, at the communion-table, or 
under some shadow that darkens all the 
world to us, we are willing to let surround- 
ing objects hide Him from us, satisfied 
that we can find Him when we keenly 
feel the need of Him, — then we are fail- 
ing to know the joy, the " full joy,'* 
of that abiding, that following, which 
might be ours. 

Oh, let us not do this ! Let us press 
closer, closer to Him, so that these be- 
wildering, bewitching things cannot hide 
Him from us or make us wander from the 
way by which He would lead us ! We 
are never safe unless we have Him full 
in our view ; unless we are so close to 
Him that at any moment we can speak 
to Him and hear what He will say to us. 
He has many a whisper of comfort and 
strength for the ear of those who are 



''Don't Let's Forget,'' etc. 137 

near enough to Him to hear, but it is 
impossible for the far-off followers to 
catch these gentle breathings. 

'' The One we are following ! " What 
leadership ! What companionship ! To 
what a consummation are we called ! 
The Lord of all, Master of heaven and 
earth, the crucified, risen Redeemer, 
comes to us from His throne on high by 
His Spirit, and offers to stay with us, com- 
fort us, strengthen us, give us victory over 
every foe, and bring us to His home above, 
if we will but follow Him. How can we 
be content with a cold, distant, sluggish 
pursuit of such blessings, — a half-hearted 
acceptance of such an invitation? God 
forgive us that we do not instantly, eagerly, 
as soon as we hear His voice, come to 
Him and stay with Him, never for one 
moment forgetting Him or ceasing to 
watch for and follow His leading. 

And when in our hearts we say, *^ Would 



138 ''Don't Let's Forget;' etc. 

that there were more such close following 
of the Master ! " let us not turn in thought 
to our neighbors or our fellow church- 
members, or to any but our own indi- 
vidual selves. In a sense the nearness of 
the life of each of us to God is known 
only to Him ; yet the fact that we are 
walking in His paths, not our own, should 
be evident to all about us. It may be 
helpful also to ourselves and others if 
once in a while we say one to another, 
" Don't let us forget the One we are 
following ! '^ 



TIRED EYES. 

As I sit by the window in my country 
home among the Connecticut hills, on 
this bright autumn day, I cannot help 
wishing that some tired eyes which I 
wot of and many of which I do not 
know might rest themselves upon what 
I see. There are so many weary eyes 
in the world, weary of city sights and 
brick walls, of dull, lonely surroundings, 
of sick-rooms, of a monotonous round 
of mechanical work, of life generally, 
with its toils and trials and disappoint- 
ments. It would not, of course, change 
any of these aspects of things, or make 
life permanently better or brighter, to 
give these eyes a glimpse of what I see, 
yet I do believe that the sight at the 



I40 Tired Eyes, 

time and the memory of it afterwards 
would be a source of some joy and strength 
to many a hard-pressed soul, in its out- 
look on this world of ours. Let me try 
to tell you what I see before me. 

Beyond the old stone walls which run 
along the wide village street and which 
are softened by vines and low bushes 
here and there, is a little piece of bright 
meadow skirting a corn-field. This last 
is on somewhat rising ground, and on 
its further side is the prettiest little grassy 
knoll you can imagine, while at the left 
hand a small bit of stone wall lifts itself 
apparently from the very midst of the 
corn, though really just outside of it. 
Then beyond, the fields roll away towards 
and up the hillside which bounds our 
horizon on the western side. Every va- 
riety of color is there, — buckwheat fields, 
now red after their cutting, green fields 
of every possible shade, corn here and 



Tired Eyes. 141 

there standing or in "shocks/^ and then 
woods on woods up to the very top of 
the hills. One dark summit lifts itself 
high enough to be called a mountain, 
and is not without some claim to the 
name. 

A few graceful elms, notably two large 
ones, stand proudly in the plain, and 
other stately trees break the level lines 
as the eye travels over the whole broad 
landscape. The course of the little river 
that winds its way along is marked by 
a low thick growth of trees and bushes 
which seem to gather about it to give 
it shade and protection in return for the 
moisture with which it feeds them. Yon- 
der at the left a small white shaft rises 
above what looks like a grove of ever- 
greens. It is the village cemetery, where 
are graves of the last century and many 
of the early part of the present one, 
with some tasteful monuments of modern 



142 Tired Eyes. 

days, — all kept in perfect order, and the 
whole spot, with its outlook towards the 
western hills, peaceful and beautiful as one 
could wish a last resting-place to be. 

All this, with the rich, mellow light of 
autumn upon it, is not to be described 
fitly by any words, only the faintest 
shadow of an idea of what it is can be 
given by pen or pencil. Sometimes 
when the setting sun throws its glory 
over this landscape as I look at it from 
my window, it really seems like a fore- 
taste of what " the Holy City, the New 
Jerusalem," will be. It does not draw 
forth many rapturous exclamations; it 
makes one feel quiet, solemn, yet glad, 
and the one word '^glorious" seems the 
only one softly and reverently to speak. 

Am I far wrong when I would like to 
have tired eyes look upon this scene and 
tired hearts take in its sweet and blessed 
meaning? Most of what it contains is 



Tired Eyes. 143 

the Father's own work, fresh from His 
hands. Has He not spread it, and many 
another picture Uke it, before our eyes, 
that we may see therein His love and 
His delight in making all things not 
only "good" but beautiful as well? 
And when we see such beauty and such 
glory in this perishable earth of ours, 
and know — because He has said it who 
cannot lie — that by and by there is to 
be "a new heaven and a new earth," 
surely we may lift up our weary eyes 
and hearts towards that better country 
with joyful anticipation that the "new" 
will be far more rich in beauty and glory 
than the old. There will be no tired 
eyes or hearts there. As we grow older, 
we grow tired oftener, sometimes we feel 
tired all the time. What will it be 
never to be tired any more, — to " mount 
up with wings as eagles," to "run and 
not be weary," to " walk and not faint " ! 



144 Tired Eyes. 



H 



Knowing that to those who are m 
Christ this is no vague, uncertain hope, 
but a certainty of absolute possession 
as soon as we are ^' clothed upon w^ith 
our house which is from heaven," let 
us bear our weariness and our suffering 
for the brief time that it is our portion, 
and joyfully read every sign which is 
given to us of the glorious rest that 
is coming. 



INFIRMITIES. 

" They came to Him to be healed of 
their infirmities." How much that last 
word must have covered then, among the 
multitudes who gathered close about the 
Master ! how much it covers now with us 
who come to Him for healing and salva- 
tion ! Our dictionaries tell us that " in- 
firmity " is "weakness, failing, fault," and 
no human philosophy can say what just 
proportion of earth's sin and misery may 
be fairly counted as flowing from that 
source. 

We can imagine the weak, fainting, 
failing ones drawing near to our Lord in 
a half-timid fashion, with none of the 
boldness of those who had positive, 
definite disease upon them. They would 

10 



146 Infirmities. 

scarcely cry out after Christ as did the 
bhnd men, or urge their suit with the 
persistence of the Syro-Phoenician woman 
pleading for her sick daughter. Never- 
theless they needed Him, oh, so sorely ! 
as many a one needs Him now who is 
*' compassed with infirmity." 

There may not be always in the gospel 
story just the distinction we imply be- 
tween infirmity and disease. The woman 
who was ^^ loosed from her infirmity" 
doubtless had a real disease, as also the 
man at Bethesda who '^ had an infirmity 
thirty-and-eight years." But there cer- 
tainly is intended in the use of the word 
a wide range of meaning, including weak- 
ness as well as positive ailment ; and it 
will do us good to fix our thought for a 
moment on our Saviour's wonderful care 
for the particular class of our many needs 
which the word suggests. 

^' Himself took our infirmities." That 



Infirmities, 147 

is the way in which Isaiah's declaration 
concerning our Lord is reproduced in 
Matthew's Gospel ; and it is but another 
form of stating the precious truth which 
we so love to clasp to our hearts, that 
" our high priest who is passed into the 
heavens is touched with the feeling of our 
infirmities." And '^ the Spirit also help- 
eth our infirmities " when we are trying, 
in our ignorance and poverty, to ask our 
Father for what we need. 

The same love — for it is " this same 
Jesus " — which met the weak and weary 
ones on Galilean or Judaean soil eighteen 
centuries ago, still turns a loving eye 
upon us and lends a patient ear to the 
tale of our infirmities. I think He must 
have been very tender with those who 
struggled to His side with a burden of 
moral and physical weakness, and who 
had only that to lay down before Him 
with a plea for healing. 



148 Infirmities, 

We are apt to be impatient with one 
another's infirmities. If our brother is 
weak when we are strong; if he falls 
when we stand firm ; if he yields to the 
voice of the tempter when we turn reso- 
lutely away; if his feet stray into paths 
which have no charm for us, — we cry out 
upon him that he has no business to be 
so easily led, that he must be infirm of 
will and unstable in principle. Not so 
would our Lord deal with him ! He 
would " heal him of his infirmity," draw 
him gently towards a better life, and 
strengthen him in it, so guiding him that 
in the end by his very weakness he 
should be made strong. 

Ah, yes ! we who are sorrowfully aware 
of our weaknesses, as distinguished from 
our positive sins, may, if we will, reach the 
point when with the apostle of old we 
can say, '' I glory in mine infirmities ! " 
Do you ask how can we — how could he 



Infirmities. 149 

— thus glory in so poor a thing? Paul 
answers you, " That the power of Christ 
may rest upon " us, making us strongest 
in Him just where we are weakest in our- 
selves, and thereby glorifying God '^ who 
giveth us the victory." Surely it is a 
wondrous ^^ healing," which can bring 
about a change like this in our attitude 
towards infirmity in ourselves or in 
others. 

Are you, who read these words, con- 
scious of some moral or mental weakness, 
at the thought of which you are humiH- 
ated and ashamed, and which you would 
gladly hide from human eyes? That is 
just the very thing to take to the throne 
of grace, to " obtain mercy " in view of 
the past, and " grace to help in time of 
need " for the future. 

On the other hand, you may be strong 
in spirit, able to bear bravely and do val- 
iantly all that enters into your appointed 



ISO Infirmities. 

lot, but sorely tried by the backwardness 
and weakness of some of those whom 
God in His Providence has placed near 
you. '' We then that are strong ought 
to bear the infirmities of the weak." So 
says Paul in words which carry the im- 
press of the Master's own Spirit. Both 
our Lord Jesus and His servant Paul were 
gentle and tender with the poor and 
weak, while their words could be like 
thunderbolts when proud, strong souls 
were to be subdued. 

What infinite comfort in the knowl- 
edge that we can bring all to Christ — 
sins, infirmities, perplexities, anxieties — 
just as they did of old, and never go 
away unheeded or unhealed ! 



I 



BASKETS AS A MEANS OF 
GRACE. 

Tabitha and I went to market together 
the other day, discussing as we went of 
things in heaven and on earth with much in- 
terest and profit to ourselves. The market 
was crowded, it being market day, and very 
soon we seemed to be in the midst of 
baskets big and Httle, round and square, 
full and empty, carried by all sorts and 
conditions of men, women, and children. 
As we calmly made our way from one 
stall to another, ordering what was to be 
sent home for us, we had to dodge these 
baskets at every turn or else be struck by 
them, so that when we came out of the 
crowd I said rather warmly to Tabitha, 
"What a nuisance these baskets are ! " 



1 5 2 Baskets as a Means of Grace. 

She did not respond then, but after- 
wards, as we sat at our sewing, she sud- 
denly said, '^ Dorcas, I am not sure that 
those baskets are not a means of grace 
to us." 

*^ What do you mean?" was my reply. 
"Baskets are just baskets, and trouble- 
some things enough when they poke you 
on every side." 

Tabitha has a meditative sort of way 
with her sometimes, especially when she 
is going to preach one of her little ser- 
mons j and I notice that whenever she 
settles herself down in that thoughtful 
fashion, Benoni, the cat, is almost sure to 
get into her lap and curl himself down for 
a sleep. I think he has an idea in his 
round gray head that she will be apt to 
sit still for a while, and moreover that 
her hands will play idly and pleasantly 
about his neck while she talks, in these 
moods. 



Baskets as a Means of Grace, 153 

Things were in just that position when 
she began this morning about the baskets, 
and in answer to me she said, '^ Well, we 
were annoyed by the crowding of baskets 
just now. I was thinking that it gave us 
an opportunity to ' think not only on our 
own things, but also on the things of 
others.' Doing this, we should see that 
many of those people were obliged to 
carry their own marketing home, not 
being able to employ any one to take it, 
and scarcely buying enough to ask for its 
free sending. In any case, they are vio- 
lating no law of right or courtesy in 
making their way as best they can, with 
their load, through the crowds of people 
bent on the same business. So we have 
no occasion to be vexed with them be- 
cause our own comfort is slightly inter- 
fered with. Then, after all," continued 
Tabitha, while Benoni got up and turned 
himself round with a stretch and a yawn. 



154 Baskets as a Means of Grace. 

and lay down again, ^' is not anything 
that annoys or tries us a means of 
grace, if we will but make it such? As 
some one has said, ^ Little worries may be 
stumbling-blocks or stepping-stones, as 
we choose to make them.' The irritations 
of daily life, pin-pricks though they may 
be, are part of the discipline our Father 
sends us, and often a far more sifting and 
proving part than great trials and tempta- 
tions. Many a one will withstand these 
last bravely and beautifully, and go down 
utterly under the petty annoyances and 
crookedness of daily life. 

'^ I do beheve," Tabitha went on, " that 
if we bear these little worries patiently, 
and let them do their quiet work upon us, 
they will soon cease very much to fret or 
trouble us, and in time they will greatly 
help in bringing out something of Christ- 
likeness in our lives. Small faults of tem- 
per in ourselves or others ; differences of 



Baskets as a Means of Grace, 155 

temperament and character in those with 
whom we hve ; the inanimate things about 
us which seem to have times of conspiring 
to go all wrong ; days when we are out of 
tune and everything consequently makes 
discord, — all these experiences are like 
the baskets in market to-day. Looking 
simply at ourselves and our own rights 
and wishes, such things will vex and 
bruise us constantly. Thinking of others 
and their needs and claims upon us, we 
shall give them all the room we can, nor 
regard their close and perhaps inconven- 
ient touch as an annoyance. And ' look- 
ing unto Jesus,' we shall learn to ^bear 
the infirmities of the weak, and not to 
please ourselves,' even in a jostling, push- 
ing, uncomfortable crowd. But you know 
all this, Dorcas, as well as I do, and here 
I am actually preaching to you as if you 
did not." 



156 Baskets as a Means of Grace. 

" Nevertheless, Tabitha, I am glad you 
have ' put me in remembrance ' of it, for 
I think the baskets on market-day will 
seem a little different to me now." 



1 



BY NAME. 

^' John " — ^' Mary " — '' I baptize thee 
in the name of the Father, and of 
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." So 
is given to the unconscious infant or to 
the adult professing his faith in Christ 
what we call the baptismal name; yet 
how often do we speak those words and 
refer to the act which they recall with 
no thought of their real, deep meaning ! 
For this giving of a " Christian " name, 
what is it? Simply the designating as 
to how one person shall be known among 
his fellows, or the paying of a pretty 
compliment to ancestor or friend? As- 
sociated with the rite of baptism, it is 
surely far more than this, for does it not 
bind the earthly name indissolubly with 



IS 8 By Name, 

that of the Triune God Himself? The 
little babe, as a ^' child of the Covenant," 
receives the name chosen for it, and is 
brought fy that na7ne into outward rela- 
tionship to the Church of Christ. The 
adult "believer in Jesus" hears his own 
familiar name linked in solemn union 
with the " Name which is above every 
name," and henceforth it should bear a 
new and sacred significance to his ear. 
For it must be by that name, if any, 
that he is known to the High and Holy 
One who " inhabiteth eternity," who not 
only "calleth the stars by their names," 
but who also said to Moses His servant, 
"I know thee by name ; " to Israel His 
chosen, " I have called thee by thy 
name ; " and to Cyrus, His appointed 
and anointed instrument, '*' I, the Lord, 
call thee by thy name," and again, ** I 
have even called thee by thy name, 
though thou hast not known Me." 



By Name, 159 

Did you ever think of that, reader? 
What a new sound it gives to our familiar 
baptismal name when we remember that 
our Divine Master may call us by it, even 
as He uttered some earthly names when 
He was in the flesh ! If to Him, as to one 
another, we bear a name, that which was 
solemnly spoken as the baptismal water 
touched our foreheads would surely be 
the one. 

It is not a thing to be proved, or even 
discussed with argument, but neither is 
it an overstraining nor an abuse of faith to 
believe that if our spiritual ears were keen 
and open as they might be, we should 
many times a day hear our Master's 

gentle voice, calling us by name, " M , 

come unto Me, and I will give you rest ; '* 

^^ M , be not faithless, but believing ; " 

'^M , if you love Me, keep my 

commandments ; " ^' M , be of good 

cheer; it is I, be not afraid; " *' M , 



i6o By Name- 

abide in Me, and I in you, for without 

Me you can do nothing;" "M , let 

not your heart be troubled. I go to 
prepare a place for you." 

Why not? Were not all those and 
many other precious words put where 
they are and kept there for the individual 
comfort and strengthening of those who 
should ** believe on Him through the 
word" of those who first heard them? 
And if so, under the wonderful law of 
Providence which is over us and which 
numbers the very hairs of our heads, 
every one of them is really spoken to 
us, as by name, by the loving Saviour who 
brought even us. His far-away children, 
within the blessed circle of His inter- 
cessory prayer. 

How we come to love our names as 
spoken by lips dear to us, and after those 
lips are silent in death, how the echo 
lingers of the voice with which they 



By Name. i6i 

called and held us by the familiar name ! 
But far sweeter, could it reach our spirit- 
ual ear, would surely be the Saviour's 
voice speaking to us each one by name, as 
the shepherd calls his sheep to his loving 
and protecting side, and wins them to 
follow where he leads. 

Our Lord would seem very seldom to 
have spoken the names of His followers, 
so far as the record goes, though indeed 
there is nothing against the belief that 
He may have uttered many a name '^ in 
accents sweet and strong," as He moved 
among the multitudes, healing and bless- 
ing as He went. Lazarus, Zacchaeus, 
Philip, Simon the Pharisee, Thomas, 
Martha, Mary, Simon, son of Jonas, — 
these names He spoke in majestic com- 
mand, in gentle reproof, in patient pity, 
in joy-giving revelation of Himself. Three 
precious utterances of earthly names were 
upon those sacred lips after the resurrec- 
II 



1 62 By Name. 

tion, — *' Mary ! " Ah, who can say what 
that one word was to her who heard it ; 
what it is to us who hear its echo ; what 
it will be to those who bear it to have it 
spoken to them by the Lord in Paradise ! 

"Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, 
thou hast believed." How infinite the 
patience which would take such pains to 
bring the backward one into full knowl- 
edge of the truth ! " Simon, son of 
Jonas, lovest thou Me?" Where was 
there ever such exquisite pity and tender- 
ness for one who had sinned, as when, so 
distinctly by name, the risen Lord gave 
poor Peter the threefold opportunity to 
declare his love for the Master whom he 
had so basely denied ! 

Perhaps our Lord took these familiar 
names upon His lips after His resurrection 
on purpose to indicate that He would 
thereby still recognize His followers, even 
when already removed from them by the 



I 



By Name. 163 

change which had passed upon Him. 

And one utterance during His life among 

them stands out with pre-eminent comfort 

and abiding inspiration to us. " Simon, 

I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail 

not." If He thus prayed for Simon, and 

if He '' ever lives to make intercession 

for us," His own, surely we may beheve 

that our names are not only "graven on 

His hands," but carried on His lips even 

to the very throne of God. 

And when the " new name in the white 

stone " is given to us in that coming day 

of glory, — the name which " no man 

knovveth saving him who receiveth it," 

— we cannot beheve that it will be 

altogether a strange one to our ears. 

All will be new in that 

" Sweet and blessed country, 
The home of God's elect ! " 

but surely neither the place, nor the 
people, nor the name given us, will be so 



1 64 By Name, 

strange as to disconnect us altogether 
from the old life and the old God-given 
affections of earth. Even with the '' secret 
of the Lord " written in that white stone, 
we may believe that some whisper of the 
old name by w^hich we entered visibly 
mto the kingdom here below will yet 
cHng about the "new name " which God 
Himself will give us. 



AUTUMN COLORS. 

I AM not thinking to-day so much of 
the brilHant autumn foliage which clothes 
New England woods, especially, with 
such wondrous beauty and glory. Truly, 
these are worth whatever tribute pen or 
pencil can render to them, and neither 
pen nor pencil can hope ever really to 
pay the debt they owe to forest and hill- 
side in these autumn months. If I wanted 
to do so, I could not forget this debt, for 
a huge maple stretches its branches close 
up to my bedroom windows, and lately 
the great arms have been waving scarlet 
twigs before my eyes, as if to say, ^^We 
have refreshed and shaded you all through 
the summer sunshine, and now we bring 
you our parting gifts of glory, that you 



1 66 Autumn Colors, 

may carry home with you a memory of 
brightness, not of gloom.'* 

But I do not want to write to-day of 
these famihar autumn glories, although my 
eyes and my soul are full of them. I 
want to say a word of some less striking 
features of autumn beauty which have 
impressed me lately more than ever 
before. Again and again, in driving 
over these hills, we have spied a radiant 
patch in a field, or by the roadside, some 
distance off, and, coming up to it, have 
recognized a common fern or bracken 
turned a brilliant yellow, — so brilliant 
that one would think it must be catching 
the rays of the setting sun. Now and 
then a whole field is thus illumined, or 
is lighted by the paler golden-rod in great 
masses of feathery blossoms. 

Then, driving along the quiet road, the 
aster, shading from nearly white to deep 
purple, lifts its pretty head on either side, 



AuHimn Colors. 167 

and nods and beckons to us as we pass j 
and a tiny, white, daisy-like flower (whose 
proper name I do not know) looks up 
with an unspoken suggestion that it will 
go well with the yellow and purple blos- 
soms already gathered for home adorn- 
ment. Here and there we see a meadow, 
or a little stream fringed with low bushes 
of every imaginable hue, which yet might 
be altogether overlooked by a careless 
passer-by. Wide-open eyes only will see 
all the beauty which autumn holds, or, 
rather, which it flings abroad for those 
who will to enjoy. 

Over the fields and woods there is a 
mellow richness never seen but in the 
early autumn days. It is not gray, nor 
brown, nor any color in particular, but 
the exquisite mingling and softening of 
many hues into a subdued tone, to be 
broken later by the glowing colors of full 
autumn glory. There is charming variety, 



1 68 Autumn Colors. 

too, in the aspect of the different fields. 
The meadows (across one of which I see 
just now a straggUng procession of cows 
slowly going home to their afternoon 
milking) are green as in midsummer, 
except for patches of red grass and the 
bright fern above mentioned. Then there 
are brown fields ready for fall planting, 
some acres of stacked buckwheat, and 
corn not yet garnered, — all different, 
and all beautiful in the autumn sunlight 
and shadow. 

As I have revelled in these quiet hues 
of nature's twilight, it seemed to me that 
there was a parallel to them in our human 
lives. There comes a time if we live 
long enough, when even the happiest life 
takes on quieter colors than of old. 
Things are not exactly dull ; there may 
even be very bright days and episodes, 
like the brilliant patches of bracken that 
I see, and all along the wayside will 



Autumn Colors, 169 

spring up sweet and gentle influences if 
we look for them. And always, behind 
and above, and stronger than all, is the 
Infinite Love which gave the summer 
beauty, gives the autumn fruit, and will 
give the winter care and secret growth. 

But life's hues are not, in our later 
years, as vivid or as enticing as they once 
were. Everything within us, if not with- 
out, also, is quieter, more subdued, and 
less insistent. Disappointment is not 
usually so keen, gratification not so in- 
tense ; sorrow is less shattering, and joy 
less blinding. In some measure, at least, 
we have learned life's lessons, and the 
teaching has revealed much that is 
precious and beautiful, while it has 
dimmed the early brightness and given 
us new views of ourselves and of others. 

But the glory that is coming ! For 
the Christian believer that is as sure as 
God is true, and the autumn days of life 



lyo Autumn Colors, 

cannot be sad or gloomy when that Light 
is cast upon them in advance. Surely 
they must be aglow with the reflection 
of the Master's own face, turned towards 
those whom He will welcome to His 
Father's house ! 

Never let us think or speak of autumn 
as a sad season, or of old age as a melan- 
choly time. Neither ought to be so. 
God does not mtend us to find autumn 
depressing, or He would never have so 
filled it with the beauty of fulfilment and 
fruition. 

Nor can our loving Father wish us to 
come nearer to our home above with 
slow, reluctant steps, and downcast 
troubled eyes. Rather would He have 
us look up into His face trustingly and 
joyfully, and travel along the road 
patiently, bravely, and cheerfully, know- 
ing that He, with His knowledge and love 
of us, leads us every step of the way. 



ON THE MOUNT. 

Twice did Moses vanish from the sight 
of Israel gathered on Sinai's plain, and 
remain forty days and forty nights hidden 
in the " thick darkness/' when Jehovah 
met and talked with him " face to face, 
as a man speaketh unto his friend." If 
we were not told whereof they talked in 
that wondrous interview, we might sup- 
pose that perhaps God lifted the veil a 
little from the eternal mysteries of other 
worlds and gave His servant a glimpse 
into His purposes and plans concerning 
the human race. We might imagine that 
some disclosure was made of the coming 
Redeemer and His sacrificial work, so 
that this favored one among mankind 



172 On the Mount. 

could even in dim vision see the glorious 
transfiguration which he should witness 
on another mount long after God had 
" buried him in a valley of Moab." 

But of what did the Almighty speak to 
Moses out of the cloud which barely con- 
cealed from the eyes of the children of 
Israel the terrible glory of His presence? 
Why, of offerings to be made of wood 
and oil, and spices, skins, and precious 
stones for the tabernacle and its furnish- 
ings ; of curtains and candlesticks and 
tables ; of dishes and bowls and spoons 
for the sanctuary, with minute details of 
the pattern and use of all these things ; 
of the altar to be built, the sacrifices to 
be offered, and the incense to be burned ; 
of the dress which Aaron and his sons 
should wear when ministering before the 
Lord; and of the workmen by name, 
whom He had chosen and fitted to exe- 
cute all which He had now commanded 



On the Mount. 173 

to be done. Were not these strange 
themes for such an interview? 

We are scarcely able to understand the 
full significance and importance of these 
details as related to the service or wor- 
ship of God. We may marvel at a ritual 
so elaborate and so exactly prescribed by 
a God who is a Spirit, and who demands, 
first of all, and beyond all, spiritual wor- 
ship and service. But in the bright light 
of the New Testament, and especially 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews, we can 
see something of the meaning and use 
of all this. Nor is there lacking a lesson 
for us in the fact that God did call 
Moses within that glorious cloud and hold 
him there for all those days and nights, 
to tell him of these apparently small 
things which He would have done "ac- 
cording to the pattern " then revealed. 

We sometimes have seasons of raptur- 
ous joy in the Lord, of blessed commu- 



174 On the Mount, 

nion with Him, and we say we have been 
^' on the mount." At such times we 
count the trivial things of daily life as 
of no account and quite separate from 
what is filling our souls and drawing us 
near to God, and we come from such 
seasons as to something low and poor, 
as well as distasteful and unprofitable, 
when we take up our every-day occupa- 
tions once more. But if in the glory that 
covered the mount where Moses spent 
those forty days, God dealt with such 
material things as curtains and dishes 
and spoons, is it profane or unseemly 
for us to carry with us into whatever 
heights of privilege are granted to us 
just those every-day affairs and homely 
duties which make up so large a part 
of our lives? The vessels spoken of 
were indeed the holy things of the sanc- 
tuary, but if, '' whether we eat or drink, 
or whatsoever we do," we are to '• do all 



On the Mount, 175 

to the glory of God," then our homehest 
concerns are touched with the brightness 
of that glory, and the thought of them 
may be carried into the very presence of 
the Lord. The oftener we lift the rela- 
tionships in which God has placed us, 
and their consequent duties, into the 
atmosphere of holiness where God dwells, 
and from which He speaks to us, the 
more will our lives be for His glory and 
for our own highest happiness. 

When Moses went the second time to 
God in the mountain, it was on a diiferent 
errand. Then he had to humble himself 
in the dust for his sinning people, and to 
beg for pardon and mercy at the hands 
of an offended God. He besought Je- 
hovah not to leave them, to go with 
them or to hold them back from going, 
to show him more of His glory then and 
there, and to renew His covenant of love 
and faithfulness to them. 



176 On the Mount. 

It was much to ask, after their grievous 
sin, and Moses might well have doubted 
whether God would heed his prayer. 
But God granted it all, while punishing 
the sin, and, with more explicitness than 
ever, made known His wonderful pur- 
poses of grace and goodness to them, 
and to those of whom they were the 
type. Was it any wonder that Moses' 
*' face shone " after this interview with 
the Most High? 

We are often stirred within us by the 
stiffneckedness and disobedience of those 
old Israelites, and by the infinite patience 
of their God with them. Do we always 
think enough of our own departures from 
the right path, the path illumined for us 
by gospel hght, and the amazing patience 
with which our Lord follows us and brings 
us back to Himself? 



QUIETNESS AND CONFIDENCE. 

" 1 WISH I could help being anxious 
about things," said Priscilla to me lately. 
" I know it is not right or wise to worry 
about my child, or about anything else, 
but it seems as if I could not help it. 
Some one told me the other day that 
I always have an anxious look, and I 
know it is so, for I am anxious. I wish 
I were not ! " 

Priscilla is a very good woman, — a 
dear Christian woman, who is not igno- 
rant of, nor indifferent to, her Heavenly 
Father's care over her. She has had 
the common experience of sorrow and 
joy, in a life of forty years or more. 
Perhaps she is right in thinking that 
some rather unusual trials have been 

12 



tyS Qtdetness and Confidence. 

in her lot, but on the whole she has 
only ordinary reasons for anxiety of mind 
concerning herself or those dear to her. 

Well, I am not one to reprove or ad- 
vise Priscilla, or anybody else, on such 
matters, yet when she thus spoke, I 
could not help thinking of Isaiah's old 
beautiful words, '^ In quietness and in 
confidence shall be your strength.'* How 
the *' quietness " would remove disturb- 
ing anxieties as to present duty, substi- 
tuting patient waiting upon God and 
doing of His will when made known ! 
How the "confidence" would dissipate 
fear for the future, and bring in its 
place abiding trust in the strong and lov- 
ing hand, which both sustains and guides 
those whom it "covers"! And what 
"strength" the quiet confidence would 
give to the spirit for its doing and 
enduring ! 

I want Priscilla to get this " strength." 



Quietness and Confidence. 179 

I know she can have it for the asking. 
She will not need to struggle for it, 
nor wait for its coming until apathetic 
old age is upon her. It may be hers 
now, in the very midst of life's cares 
and anxieties, for she may lay these all 
at the dear Master's feet, and leaving 
them there^ bear away with her the calm 
trustfulness which shall make her strong 
and glad. How I wish I could lead 
her to believe this, and to try to make 
the gift her own ! 

I do not think that when Isaiah wrote 
those inspired words he meant to ad- 
dress them only or mainly to people 
of easy, sunny temperament, to whom 
quietness and confidence are natural or 
habitual. I think he meant them as 
much, if not more, for those of fretting, 
fussing, worrying disposition, who could 
only by the grace of God pass out of 
their worries into the tranquillity of faith 



i8o Quietness and Confidence. 

and trust. I think he meant, or his 
Master meant through him, to tell Pris- 
cilla, and others like her, where their 
true strength and peace can be found. 

But a far sweeter voice would whisper 
in Priscilla's ear, if only she would listen 
to it, '^ Let not your heart be troubled ; " 
" The very hairs of your head are all 
numbered ; " *' Your Father knoweth what 
things ye have need of;" ^^ Ask, and ye 
shall receive, that your joy may be full; " 
'^My peace I give unto you." Hear- 
ing that voice day by day, hour by hour, 
and letting its full meaning and power 
enter into her heart of hearts, Priscilla's 
anxieties will be calmed, her fears stilled, 
her furrowed brow smoothed, and her 
soul made strong for service or for 
suffering. 



THOSE THAT "REMAIN." 

Whatever may be our views about the 
second coming of our Lord, — its when, 
its how, its where, — we cannot but be- 
lieve that on that day of days the hfe of 
the world will be going on in its custom- 
ary fashion. The sun will rise on that 
morning as it has risen from its beginning, 
to make its daily pilgrimage before the 
eyes of all who look upon it. And it 
will waken the birds and flowers with its 
kiss, and send the shadows flying and the 
noxious things into hiding everywhere, as 
it has done for thousands of years. We 
have no reason to suppose that any un- 
usual appearances in nature will accom- 
pany the dawning of that day, or that 
the old earth will, by any distinct demon- 



1 8 2 Those that ' ' Remain . ' ' 

stration, show that it is aware of the com- 
ing change. 

Even if the Apostle Paul did not tell 
us with inspired pen, we should naturally 
expect that when that time comes, part 
of God's flock would still be upon the 
earth. Whether or not he made the 
mistake of believing in the reappear- 
ance of the Lord in his day (as some 
believe that he did), the truth remains 
that there will be believers as well as 
others living their earthly lives just as 
we now do, when the end shall come. 
So far as we are told, it is not to be 
a time when everything will be visibly 
finished and settled on earth ; when 
lives will all be far advanced, none at 
their beginning ; when all man's ordinary 
affairs will be wound up, waiting for the 
trumpet's sound ; when the attitude of 
all created things will be simply one of 
expectation. 



Those that ''Remain.'' 183 

Not thus will the great day find the 
world. On the contrary, it would seem 
that everything will be going on just as 
usual. Here and there a watchful soul, 
quick to catch the faintest echo of the 
Master's step, may have been noting the 
signs of the times and have perceived 
significance and warning in them ; but 
the great majority of men and women 
will probably be going on their usual 
way, buying and selling, making and 
mending, visiting and entertaining, heal- 
ing and hurting, preaching and studying, 
sinning and serving, looking blindly earth- 
ward or gazing with loving eyes heaven- 
ward. But those that " remain " of God's 
own " little flock," who will they be? 

There will be sick and weary ones on 
earth that day, — when are there not 
such? How they will start and listen 
and leap to their feet as they hear the 
voice telling them that the Deliverer has 



1 84 Those that ''Remain:' 

come ! There will be sorrowful, lonely, 
bereaved disciples then as always in this 
world of partings. What will it be to 
them to hear the summons to join their 
loved ones with the Lord " in the air " ! 
Soldiers of Christ the world over, scarred 
and sore from their long conflict, weary 
of the fightings within and foes without, 
will joyfully lay down their weapons and 
realize that their " warfare is accom- 
pUshed," their victory won. 

Faithful servants of their Lord will hail 
His coming with joy and not with grief; 
not because their service has been per- 
fect or meritorious, but because they 
have " done it unto Him,'' and because 
He has called them '' friends." Many 
lowly ones will look up in that day, mar- 
velling that the Lord should be mindful 
of them in their low estate, and summon 
them to such honor and joy as they see 
set before them. 



Those that '* Remain.'' 185 

But the careless, slothful, merely 
nominal servants, — what dread of the 
Master's call, what intense desire to 
postpone the coming for a little, will 
take possession of their souls ! Can we not 
hear their pleas and excuses ? They did 
not think He was coming just then ; they 
knew that all things continued as they 
had been since the beginning ; they saw 
no sign of any approaching change ; if 
they had, they would at once have set to 
work to prepare for it; they could not 
always be looking and watching for what 
seemed to be so far away; surely they 
should have had some notice, some warning 
of such an awful crisis close at hand. Of 
the terror and dismay of those who have 
served Satan and not God, who would 
have none of Christ or His salvation, 
who by word or deed have declared 
their belief that there is no God, and 
now see Him coming " in the clouds of 



iS6 Those that ''Remain.'' 

heaven " to judge the world, we cannot 
speak. 

Only a very little way into the mys- 
teries of that day are we permitted to 
look. God has not told us much of it, 
only enough to satisfy us that it will 
come, that '' of the day and the hour 
knoweth no man," and that those be- 
lievers who then ^'remain" upon the 
earth will follow the resurrection host 
into the clouds, to "be ever with the 
Lord." 

The Master will have His servants with 
Him where He is, their glorified bodies 
as well as their redeemed souls, and so 
He calls them from their graves, if they 
have ^^ fallen asleep," and from their 
earthly lives, if they '^ remain." He will 
have "come again" when that day closes, 
and have " received " them all " unto 
Himself." When we think of it thus, it 
seems to make very little difference in 



Those that "'Remain.'" 187 

which company we are found, if only we 
are " in Him." He knows who will be 
among "the dead in Christ" at that day, 
and who will " remain " and enter heaven 
through another gate than that of death 
and the grave. 

It would appear that they are wise 
above what is written, who try to inter- 
pret prophecy or read current events in 
such a way as to foretell the time or the 
attending circumstances of Christ's com- 
ing. Nor is it desirable that we should 
be able to do this. Enough if each one 
of us, day by day, and every moment, so 
live that our Lord, whenever He comes 
for us, may find us doing His work, bear- 
ing the burdens of His appointment, and 
joyfully responsive to His call. 



SUFFER THEM TO COME 
UNTO ME. 

When God takes a little child to Him- 
self, no father's love or mother's prayer 
avails to bring it again to their arms. 
The Shepherd calls, and the little lamb 
must obey His voice. From the "green 
pastures " and " still waters " of the 
heavenly fold, it would be a rude transit 
even to a tender mother's embrace, and 
we may well believe that the child would 
not willingly come back, were it possible 
to repass the dark valley. 

Jesus says, not only to those who would 
have hindered the little ones from coming 
to Him on earth, but also to those who 
would hold back their loved ones from 
His presence in heaven, ^^ Suffer the 



Suffer them to Come unto Me, 189 

little children to come unto Me." And 
when He says this He means more than 
compulsory submission. He means that 
when it is evidently His will that they 
shall go to Him, their loving parents shall 
give them up to His arms, — not without 
sorrow for their loss, but with full, perfect 
submission to that will. 

How inexpressibly gentle and persua- 
sive is the voice that here speaks to those 
who are longing to hold or to bring back 
their beloved children who have gone 
to heaven, entreating them not to wish to 
keep them from Him ! *^ Suffer them to 
come to Me, oh, fond and sorrowing 
parents ! Your care for them could never 
be what Mine is ; your love could never 
reach the height or depth of Mine ; your 
wisdom could not guide nor your watch- 
fulness guard them as they will be led 
and protected in this heavenly home. 
Would you keep them to sin and to 



190 Suffer them to Come unto Me, 

suffer, you know not to what degree, 
when they can be at once set free from a 
body of sin and suffering, to rejoice among 
happy spirits in hght and glory forever? 
Of such is the kingdom of heaven. Oh, 
suffer them to come to Me ! " 

Yes, blessed Saviour, we give them into 
Thy hands, — not because we must, but 
because it is Thy will thus early to bless 
them by taking them to Thyself. Only 
fit us to follow and meet them in Thy 
presence at last, to go no more out 
forever. 



SHOWING FORTH HIS DEATH. 

A COMMUNION THOUGHT. 

As I sat at the communion-table to- 
day, and heard the beautiful, famiUar 
words, ^* Ye do show the Lord's death till 
He come," I thought how strangely they 
would sound to one who heard or heeded 
them for the first time. Why do you 
want to show forth His death? might 
such an one ask. Was not that the 
climax of His humiliation? the triumph 
of His enemies? the bitter disappoint- 
ment of His friends ? Did it not for the 
moment mean only defeat, shame, over- 
throw? When He cried, " It is finished," 
and when His sorrowing disciples laid 
away His lifeless body in Joseph's tomb, 



192 Showing forth His Death, 

was not that chapter so closed that none 
need ever open it again? 

Show forth His beautiful, spotless life as 
much as you will. Set up His example 
for imitation of all time. Dwell on His 
resurrection and ascension and the glory 
in which the Apostle John beheld Him. 
But let the painful, humiliating part of 
His life as the Son of man be forgotten 
as far as possible. It is there, we ac- 
knowledge that ; but it surely need not be 
dwelt upon or emphasized, as you Chris- 
tians seem to find such satisfaction in 
doing. 

Nay, it is not we who emphasize this 
great paradox of history, this mystery of 
redemption, that it is the dying Christ 
who brings us pardon and justification 
and eternal life. The Lord Himself has 
bidden His people in all ages to show forth 
His death, and has secured their doing it 
by establishing, for all time, the ordinance 



Showing forth His Death. 193 

which sets forth that one thing. The 
broken body and the poured out blood 
are never to be put out of sight until the 
glorified body appears to take their place 
before the eyes and in the minds of the 
followers of Christ. 

And even with our poor vision we can 
see the reason of this. We love to think 
of our Master's lovely life, with its con- 
stant flow of blessed ministration to the 
needy of every kind and degree. We 
talk and sing with growing delight of the 
manger and the shepherds and all the 
sweet stories of our Lord's coming into 
this world of ours. We follow Him along 
the way, and listen to His wise, strong, 
gentle words to His friends and His foes, 
and we linger long over those last infinitely 
tender sayings to His " own," whom He 
" loved to the end." 

But then it might well be that we would 
gladly skip over the terrible scenes which 
13 



194 Showing forth His Death. 

followed, until we find Him again in the 
garden, speaking Mary's name in familiar 
tones; within the closed doors dealing 
gently with Thomas' doubts ; walking with 
the " two " towards Emmaus, and making 
their *^ hearts burn within them " by His 
wondrous words ; and then by the lake 
breaking bread with the favored few and 
giving repentant Peter the threefold op- 
portunity to declare the love which he 
once forswore. All this we delight to 
keep in memory and recount to listening 
ears ; but that Jesus our Lord " was cru- 
cified, dead and buried," from this thought 
we naturally shrink, even while we accept 
it as part of our creed. 

Yet we must believe that our Lord 
would not have us thus pass over the time 
of His '' bruising for our iniquities," His 
" wounding for our transgressions." It is 
His ^^ blood ^^ that cleanseth us from our 
sins, — not His works of mercy or His 



Showing forth His Death. 195 

words of love. Therefore, when He es- 
tablishes a memorial feast and a sacra- 
ment of grace for His church, it is His 
death which He makes its central thought 
and its true significance. He knows our 
weakness, our liability to forget even what 
we would remember, and our tendency to 
lose sight of sin and its terrible power, 
and so He gives us an ordinance which 
shall always bring to mind the price paid 
to deliver us from this great enemy and 
to '^ bring us to God." 

Showing forth this one thing in its full- 
est and holiest meaning, it also points 
onward to the time when, coming again 
in the clouds of heaven. He will gather 
those whom He has '^ bought with His 
own precious blood " from every nation 
and kindred and people, and bring them 
to join in the song of praise to ^^ the 
Lamb that was slain." We can never 
think too rapturously of our Lord's resur- 



196 Showing forth His Death. 

rection from the dead and ascension into 
glory ; but as our sins crucified Him, and 
His death is the door to our eternal life, 
we must ever with humble gratitude and 
adoring love obey His own command to 
" show the Lord's death till He come.'' 



ANOTHER COMMUNION 
THOUGHT. 

During an observance lately of our 
blessed communion feast, a thought came 
to me which has stayed with me until the 
wish to pass it on has arisen. I imagined 
an announcement made that, after the 
service should be over, the Master, who 
had been with His people at the table, 
would visibly wait for a while in one part 
of the church to receive requests, impart 
help or counsel, and listen to any story 
of sorrow or anxiety which those present 
might wish to tell Him. Then I imag- 
ined the service concluded, the benedic- 
tion pronounced, and the hush which 
followed while the divine form became 
visible, and realization dawned of the 
wondrous opportunity offered. 



198 Another Communion Thought. 

Would there be any in that congrega- 
tion who would turn away from the wait- 
ing One yonder, careless of the privilege 
which might be theirs? Perhaps some 
children or young people might hasten 
out with no special sense of need or loss, 
yet, even among them, I fancied little 
eager faces turned towards Him, flushed 
with the thought of having His hand laid 
upon their heads in blessing, as of old. 

But how the men and women would 
crowd around the gracious Saviour, of 
whose dying love they had just been 
thinking so tenderly and gratefully ! 
How they would wait their turn to speak 
to Him, watch the loving face, listen for 
the gentle voice, and gather into as earn- 
est words as possible the heart-history 
they would tell ! I think each one would 
gain the Master's ear alone, and be able so 
to speak the grief or perplexity or trouble, 
whatever it were, as if none other were in 



Another Communion Thought. 199 

that Presence just then. And I am sure 
that the Master's word and look and 
touch would seem to each one as pre- 
cious as if no other shared it at that 
moment. 

How the pent-up, perhaps unsuspected, 
anguish of one heart would pour itself out 
with an infinite sense of reUef! How 
one and another would tell of besetting 
sins, resisted but unconquered, and beg 
the Divine One to give such grace that 
the enemy to peace could be wholly sub- 
dued ! How the sad story of some wan- 
dering ones would be told, and power to 
bring them back besought ! How here 
and there a cold and careless one would 
be reluctantly led by the hand of some 
friend, that the eyes which are as '' a 
flame of fire " might pierce to the soul 
and kindle love to Christ there ! How 
bereaved ones would creep up to Him, 
and unveiling their tearful faces, entreat 



2 00 Another Communion Thought. 

Him to tell them again of their beloved 
whom He has taken, and who are through 
Him '' alive forevermore " ! How proud, 
cold faces would soften and sweeten as 
they looked into that wondrous Face, and 
saw the comfort and blessing which a 
brief interview with the Master could 
bring to all who came to Him ! And 
what a different home-going, what a to- 
tally new taking up of the old burdens 
and duties, would follow such face-to-face 
converse with our Lord ! 

So my imagination went on and on, 
until I came suddenly back to the thought 
that just what I had been picturing to 
myself had doubtless as really taken place 
as if it had been seen by mortal eyes 
and heard by human ears. As we sat 
there in the solemn quiet of our com- 
munion service, our Lord Jesus had beeii 
with us ! Surely each believing heart 
had spoken to Him in far fuller manner 



Another Communion Thought. 201 

than in words, and into each He had 
breathed strength and pardon and com- 
fort in greater measure than mere lan- 
guage could convey. 

Moreover, we were not going away 
from Him when we left the house of God 
and took our homeward way. With each 
one of us, whatever our place and work, 
whatever our burden or sorrow, our sin or 
our suffering, the Master would go. Not 
to one brief, hurried interview, with the 
sense of waiting ones around us and the 
need of haste, are we restricted in our 
approach to the Redeemer. Always, 
everywhere, with everything, we can go 
to Him, knowing of a surety that He is 
never weary, never beyond our reach, 
never impatient with our folly and way- 
wardness, never slow to help in our time 
of need. 

So, as we go from our communion 
feast, we may well rejoice that it is not 



202 Another Communion Thought. 

only in one corner of a church, for a 
little time on one Sabbath day, bound by 
conditions of flesh and sense, that we 
may have the joy and strength of Christ's 
presence. We may well, from our inmost 
hearts, be glad that, every day, 

*' All unseen, the Master walketh 
By His toiling servant's side ; 
Comfortable words He speaketh, 

While His hands uphold and guide." 



THEIR MESSAGE. 

Two winged messengers come daily, to 
my windows, which are lifted higher in 
God's air than is usual in a city home. 
From their point of view, they come for 
the food and drink which awaits them, 
and which seems so well to satisfy them 
that they fly straight to it again and again 
through the day. 

But what message do they bring to me 
as I watch and welcome them ? 

Well, they give me many a thought of 
brightness and cheer, until I have almost 
come to think that the message was given 
them to bring. 

They tell me of the freedom of a life 
that has wings, the great circles which it 
can compass, and the pure air into which 






202 Another Communion Thought. 

only in one corner of a church, for a 
little time on one Sabbath day, bound by 
conditions of flesh and sense, that we 
may have the joy and strength of Christ's 
presence. We may well, from our inmost 
hearts, be glad that, every day, 

" All unseen, the Master walketh 
By His toiling servant's side ; 
Comfortable words He speaketh, 

While His hands uphold and guide." 



THEIR MESSAGE. 

Two winged messengers come daily, to 
my windows, which are lifted higher in 
God's air than is usual in a city home. 
From their point of view, they come for 
the food and drink which awaits them, 
and which seems so well to satisfy them 
that they fly straight to it again and again 
through the day. 

But what message do they bring to me 
as I watch and welcome them ? 

Well, they give me many a thought of 
brightness and cheer, until I have almost 
come to think that the message was given 
them to bring. 

They tell me of the freedom of a life 
that has wings, the great circles which it 
can compass, and the pure air into which 



204 Their Message, 

it can rise. Then they speak to me of 
the freedom of the soul that can lift it- 
self — or rather be hfted by the wings of 
faith — far above the smoke and dust and 
stain of earthly life into the sweet pure 
atmosphere of God's love and fellowship 
in Christ Jesus, and of the wideness of 
the expanse into which such communion 
will carry the spirit. 

They tell me how while in the world 
one need not be of it ; how no taint pr 
pollution from what is of the earth, 
earthy, need touch the one who will 
obey the commands of the higher nature 
which is sanctified by the indwelling of a 
Spirit not his own. They bring to me 
upon their wings a breath of pure, strong 
air which they have gathered in their 
sweeping course through higher regions 
than mine. 

The same message might be brought 
by less beautiful carriers, whereas their 



Their Message. 205 

very beauty brings not only an added 
charm, but an added message. They 
are beautiful, these two who come to me. 
One is of the purest white, her downy 
feathers, and her outstretching wings ex- 
quisite in their spotlessness, while her 
pretty head with its little bright eyes turns 
with many a quick, graceful motion. The 
other is brown, except the tips of his 
wings, which are white, and his neck, 
whereon are the loveliest purple and 
dark-green shades, in the sunlight often 
seeming iridescent. 

The beauty of these messengers often 
makes me think how good our God is, 
in that He so greatly ministers to the 
love of the beautiful, which He has 
implanted in us who are made in His 
image. If, as we may well imagine, He 
rejoices in the beauty of the world which 
He has created, who can picture or dream 
of what He has in store beyond, in the 



2o6 Their Message. 

true Home of the soul, when every «iar- 
ring or disturbing element will be forever 
gone, and our eyes will be adjusted to 
behold the wondrous things awaiting 
them. 

AVell, my messengers are, after all, only 
two pigeons who of their own accord 
have come to me through the winter 
cold, the spring sunshine, and the sum- 
mer heat. But they brought me a mes- 
sage, and I want to pass it on. 



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